Monday, September 25, 2006

Celebrating, Protecting the Freedom to Read

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read is observed during the last week of September each year. Observed since 1982, the annual event reminds Americans not to take this precious democratic freedom for granted.

Some of us have experienced, first-hand, a conflict with the censors, the banners and the burners ...
my own experience came a few years back, in Fort Stockton, when a small-but-vocal group came forward and pressed the school board there to place restrictions on Rudolfo Anaya's "Bless Me, Ultima" ... some calling for it to be removed, altogether from library shelves.

According to the American Library Association,
Banned Books Week (BBW) celebrates the freedom to choose or the freedom to express one’s opinion even if that opinion might be considered unorthodox or unpopular and stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of those unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints to all who wish to read them.

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