Alberta's conservative government just discovered that banning books about authoritarian control might make you look authoritarian.
As reported in the Guardian, Premier Danielle Smith had to slam the brakes on her shiny new book ban after librarians dutifully started pulling classics like The Handmaid's Tale, 1984, and Brave New World off the shelves, novels about totalitarian governments controlling what people can read.
The premier, angry that her vague directive about "explicit sexual content" could be interpreted broadly, accused school boards of "vicious compliance." Which is basically what happens when you tell librarians to start censoring books.
Canadian author Margaret Atwood, responded by tweeting a short story mocking Smith's authoritarian dictate.
Here's a piece of literature by me, suitable for seventeen-year-olds in Alberta schools, unlike — we are told — The Handmaid's Tale. (Sorry, kids; your Minister of Education thinks you are stupid babies.)
John and Mary were both very, very good children. They never picked their noses or had bowel movements or zits. They grew up and married each other, and produced five perfect children without ever having sex. Although they claimed to be Christian, they paid no attention to what Jesus actually said about the poor and the Good Samaritan and forgiving your enemies and such; instead, they practised selfish rapacious capitalism, because they worshipped Ayn Rand. (Though they ignored the scene in The Fountainhead where "welcomed rape" is advocated, because who wants to dwell, and also that would have involved sex and would de facto be pornographic. Well, it kind of is, eh?) Oh, and they never died, because who wants to dwell on, you know, death and corpses and yuk? So they lived happily ever after. But while they were doing that The Handmaid's Tale came true and Danielle Smith found herself with a nice new blue dress but no job. The end.
Smith insists this was never about "banning books." She just wanted to ban certain books.
"I'm going to be more explicit than usual so there is no misunderstanding this policy," Smith Tweeted. "1. Get graphic pornographic images out of school libraries. 2. Leave the classics on the shelves. 3. We all know the difference between the items in 1 and 2. Let's not play any more games in implementing this policy for our kids."
Ah yes, the old "we all know what we mean" trick — deliberately imprecise language used by every despot to let them do whatever they want.
Previously:
• Virginia book-ban enthusiast sues Barnes and Noble for showing books to minors
• Book-ban advocates gnash teeth over Utah school Bible removal
• Ed Scare: book bans spreading across America, driven by conservative rage
