"Videodrome is offensive"

[South Texan]

Apparently she didn't actually know what it was about; she just saw 'Angels' in the title and took it home. I think she was quite surprised.

While I worked for a small, Catholic university, a nun once ordered a movie for her English as a second language class to watch. We deliverd the video monitor and started the movie for her. Not ten minutes later, the now white faced nun ran into our department with the tape and gasped that this was NOT the Elizabeth Taylor film she had ordered. I looked at the film's title and asked her if she had meant to order National Velvet rather than Blue Velvet.

She was a sweet one.

[blas]

I remember "banned book week" in high school. That may be one of the only things I remember about school.....

Who in their right mind would ban classic American literature like Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn?

Edit to add: If I remember correctly, the whole idea of reading books that were "banned" actually MADE kids want to read them. Even students who didn't care much for English class or school in general.

[SG15Z]

Both 1984 and Animal Farm were on the required lists at my high school.

So were the Bronte Sisters. I'd rather amputate my own leg without anesthetic than have to go through another Bronte book.

B

Yeah only our required book was A Brave New World! What an... interesting book.

[Aethian]

Grapes of Wrath, one of the few READABLE books from school.

I LOVED that book, I also love how Mom has a lot of those banned books on her personal bookshelf. I get to read them whenever I head over to her place. I used to remember some place that a banned list was posted. Some of the best books on that list.

[Rapscallion]

Years ago a City councilmember was offended by the Jenna Jameson book (How to Make Love Like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale) and we had to keep the copies in storage.

Let me guess.

"It wasn't at all what I expected it to be from the title!"

Rapscallion

[AriRashkae]

Edit to add: If I remember correctly, the whole idea of reading books that were "banned" actually MADE kids want to read them. Even students who didn't care much for English class or school in general.

Yep. Day 1 of banned book week, my best friend and I were in the cool English teacher's class, waiting for her to post the list so we could snatch it and run to the library for copies. (We brought it back.) The next year she had copies made up for us.

[cinema guy]

Why? Are dancing penguins really that offensive?

Mumble is a dancing penguin born into a colony of singing penguins. He says, "You have to accept me for who I am. I can't change" - which is apparently a plea for recognition of gay identity, and a subtext stating that homosexuality is genetic. Or some other such bull .

[Boggles]

So were the Bronte Sisters. I'd rather amputate my own leg without anesthetic than have to go through another Bronte book.

B

Try living close enough to Haworth AKA Bronte Country that English Lit lessons can be held in the grounds of the Bronte Parsonage. And you can visit the family tomb before retiring to the village green to read the next bit In Context.

"And if you were Charlotte Bronte boggles, what would you be trying to impress upo the reader with these words?"
"Please miss, Is it that my bum is going numb sat in the cold wet grass and I think a worm has just got in my shoe."

[Skrae]

Hmm, if I recall, when I was in elementary school, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was on my school's list of banned books, don't remember why...

[depechemodefan]

To be honest, I think the only book that's generally considered Permanently Banned in the vast Majority of the world is Mein Kampf, for obvious reasons that invoke Godwin's Law.

We have copies of Mein Kampf on the shelves. There was this one guy who came in and he called it "My Stuggle" and tried to spell "Mein Kampf" and I was being difficult with him. Not because of the book but because if he's not going to bother to spell "struggle" much less "mein" or "Kampf", then we are doing it the hard way. So I got him to type the author's name, but because how the catalog is set up every frickin' book about Hitler popped up. So I get him to scroll through the titles and he passes right by the book.


These aren't banned (as far as I know):

We used to own Anarchist Cookbook but copies are always getting stolen.

Pimp: The Story of My Life, by Iceberg Slim. I would call it Pimp: the Pimp who found Jesus. But anyway, that book gets stolen a lot. A lot of older men ask for the book and that is the most requested book through Interlibrary Loan.

If I were to ban a movie it would be National Treasure, Book of secrets. Note, SPOILERS. I'm not a history major, but a lot of that movie just yells "wrong!" to me. Oh, not stuff like the President's book but stuff like some Spaniard was shippwreaked in Fl and the indians took him to their treasure which are in present day South Dakota, and it's an Olmac city of gold. Too much WTF for me. Oh, and Queen Victoria would not personally write to a Confederate. It's just freakin' God-aweful. I watched it through, though.

[lineswine]

Try living close enough to Haworth AKA Bronte Country

Yes, I got dragged to "bloody Haworth" on a school trip too. I've never felt the urge to read any books authored by the Brontes, either. Funny that, isn't it?

[wynjara]

Much as I might personally hate a book (anything by Steinbeck, Catcher in the Rye, a few others), I would never say to ban it. Even books whose opinions/beliefs/morals I vehemently oppose stand as something I can point to and say, "Here's another opinion. Check it out, I'll tell you mine, and you can see which makes more sense to you."
Fahrenheit 451 was one of the most frightening books I ever read. Closely followed by 1984, Brave New World, Animal Farm and The Handmaid's Tale because it's not too hard to see them happening.

Although I wouldn't have minded if, just *once*, we could have read something in school with a HAPPY ending.

[RootedPhoenix]

Yeah only our required book was A Brave New World! What an... interesting book.

......I'll go with interesting.....

Not that it wasn't well written or anything. I thought it was very well written. But yes. Interesting book, that one.

[wagegoth]

Many people wanted to ban "Happy Feet" because it supported global warming and climate change while these people believed that those things are not occurring and watching the movie disturbed their children.

[hecubus]

I was very lucky, in that , as far as I know, no books were banned at my high school, which is kind of odd, since I went to school in a small (1500 people) town in Central Wisconsin, just the sort of place you would expect books to be banned.

I can remember finding and reading reading Dr. Strangelove in my high school library. It's not a "dirty" book, per se, but it does have some very suggestive character names and the whole idea that our government is run by idiots. I can also remember finding a book with some of the goriest WWII pictures I had ever seen, and also found several pamphlets on how to build booby traps.

I never understood book banning. The reason we have freedom of speech and freedom of the press guaranteed in this country is so that controversial and unpopular ideas can be expressed. Popular ideas need no protection.