Tennessee Williams Banned in Alabama?- Page 2

[Elphaba]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 5:03pm

interesting that many thought Nazi germany could not happen here......how long til they burn books?

how long til they round us up and put us in camps.

disgusting......

[paradox_error]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 5:23pm

The pink/rainbow arm patches have been discussed before...

[robbiej]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 5:38pm

I usually bristle at the analogy to Nazi Germany...but not today.

What we are seeing is a systematic dehumanization that is absolutely appalling. First, we are blamed for 9/11 and are compared to animals. Next, the single party that is in control in this country advocates amending the Constitution of the United States to, for the first time, limit the freedoms of a segment of its population in order to 'protect' the overwhelming majority. Now, someone would like to erase us from the culture. Did anybody know that a Cardinal in Spain said legalizing gay marriage will lead to a situation akin to the Nazi death camps? No f*cking joke.

What's most appalling are our Republican friends who'll say, 'It's never going to happen. You're overreacting.' Apologists whose true silence will pave the way for terrible, terrible things in this country. Weimar Berlin was a pretty hopping place in 1929...full of free-thinkers and openness regarding sexuality. And look what happened there.

[Unknown User]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 5:48pm

I believe it was that wise polical analyst Jon Stewart who observed in the days after the election "Looking at these results, I'd say tonight might be your last chance to visit a library or engage in some gay sex...I believe I might just try to kill two birds with one stone!"

[Elizabeth_DeBris]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 5:48pm

I don't think I've ever actually been afraid of living in America, until right now. Is this really what we're coming to, as a nation?

I feel sick.

[paradox_error]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 5:55pm

The rest of the world has been seeing that America is sick for some time now.

Maybe all the "god bless america"'s have been messing with your minds...

[Snaps]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 6:01pm

Reading things like this makes me sad and angry and sick.

[Plum]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 6:29pm

Guys, come on. Look at other trends- 20 years after upholding an anti-sodomy law, the Supreme Court reversed itself and decided to strike them all down. At least partly because of all these gay marriage controverseys, homosexuality is being brought out into the open and discussed in mainstream culture more than ever before. I don't see a whole lot of faith in the "marketplace of ideas" here, but the reason we want libraries to have literature of all kinds is to maintain that very marketplace.

You can look at this as a straight line leading to queers being locked up in camps, or you can look at how the situations of non-whites and women have improved over the years, instead. As awful as this sounds, Jews didn't have an organized civil rights movement fighting for them in Weimar Germany.

And finally, on a more pragmatic and immediate note- do you guys really think this law is going to pass and stick around? No way. First of all, librarians really hate being told what to do, and they've been more than willing to fight censorship attempts in the past. Second, the fact that this law extends to works by gay authors(!), no matter what the content of the works, pretty much guarantees its demise. You really think there aren't some dry textbooks out there written by gays?

[grownupgroupie]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 7:21pm

Wonder how our White House's resident Stepford Librarian would feel about this.


(And Plum, you are a rockstar. Always love reading your articulate and insightful posts!)

[Elphaba]

Posted: 4/28/05 at 7:43pm

she was only a librarian for a moment.......she doesn't count. I don't even think she has her MLIS

[Elphaba]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 1:45pm

"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out - because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me - and there was no one left to speak out for me."
-Martin Niemoller 1892-1884


don't forget this people. It CAN happen here

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 1:58pm

Of course it can. It can happen anywhere where people attempt to separate and differentiate a particular segment of society for the purpose of marking them out as different and shameful.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 2:11pm

"I usually bristle at the analogy to Nazi Germany...but not today. What we are seeing is a systematic dehumanization that is absolutely appalling."

You forgot to mention killing people like Terri Schiavo. That's one of the first things Hitler did, kill off people he deemed "defective".

[jrb_actor]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 2:23pm

Goth---YOU'RE NEXT!

MuaHahahahahahahAHahahahahahahHa!

[Gothampc]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 2:35pm

"Goth---YOU'RE NEXT!"

Nah, we fundies live long lives. The Pope died, Prince Rainier died, but Jerry Falwell took a licking and keeps on ticking.

BwaHahahahahahahAHahahahahahahHa!

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 2:38pm

Oh.my.god.
That's EXACTLY the problem with having a fundamental view of something.
Doesn't agree with your principles AFTER you've fought so long and hard for the right (i.e. spousal privileges over one another...correction: heterosexual spousal privileges!) to have something, when someone does something with which you disagree, anyone who approves of that action is an evil, activist liberal who must be defeated.
The rest of the nation clearly disagrees with you on that one, Gotham, even many of your own fundamental party.
And courts ruling that a husband has the legal rights over his wife is HARDLY the same as attempting to ban books because you disagree with their contents.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 2:45pm

"And courts ruling that a husband has the legal rights over his wife is HARDLY the same as attempting to ban books because you disagree with their contents."

Chill out, bwaysinger. I'm not making a parallel between the Schiavo case and book banning. The point that I made was that in Nazi Germany, Hitler started out by 1) banning books and 2) killing people he didn't see as productive. The two are only related in that they were tactics used by Hitler.

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 2:46pm

And they're completely separate and specious comments.
No one in political power killed Terri Schiavo. That decision was left to the people who had legal rights over her. Our government interfered and, in doing so, got America's back up against politicians.
Banning books is a specifically political and governmental move, something Hitler would do.
So, unless you're saying Michael Schiavo is Hitler for allowing his wife to rest and he's also trying to ban certain books in Alabama, you'd be incorrect.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 2:55pm

Robbiej said: "What we are seeing is a systematic dehumanization that is absolutely appalling."

Starving someone to death, as they did Terri Schiavo, is exactly that, a systematic dehumanization. It's exactly what Hitler would have done. At least with criminals, they are given a lethal injection.

[jrb_actor]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 3:01pm

Goth, are you a member of the American Taliban?

(Jerby ducks)

Updated On: 4/29/05 at 03:01 PM

[robbiej]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 3:38pm

'Nah, we fundies live long lives.'

Yes...long FAT lives.

Anyone see the report on Good Morning, America this morning about how Christians are the FATTEST people in America. Top fattest religions, in order:

Baptist
Methodist
Protestant (grouped together)
Catholics

Thinnest religions?

Jewish
Islamic
Hindi
Buddhist

I'm gonna sell a new t-shirt:

JESUS MAKES YOU FAT!

[Gothampc]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 3:44pm

Too late robbiej, it's already been said.

Psalm 92

13Those that be planted in the house of the LORD shall flourish in the courts of our God.

14They shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be fat and flourishing;

15To shew that the LORD is upright: he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.

[robbiej]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 3:49pm

So Jesus wants us to be fat?

Are you saing Calista Flockhart and Lara Flynn Boyle are going to hell?

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 3:49pm

Psalms is old testament, right?
What do the Jews read?

So God said they'd be fat. Guess there went that argument.

[IMsooHyprToday]

Posted: 4/29/05 at 5:00pm

who wants to live there anyway.