1aspirit
I wrote something that wasn't appropriate for the thread that inspired it and want part of it to get out away from me. We might as well have a thread for when any member feels this way.
I read webcomics from creators around the world, including from Ukraine, Russia, Hong Kong, and China. The writers and artists not only have to deal with bombs being dropped on their city, their homes being raided by soldiers or police, arrest from posting their work, and all of the fearful events expected in their individual countries at this time; but they also have to put up with other, supposedly-freer countries' legal battles over who should be allowed to see what content. Hosting sites based in the USA and South Korea censor their work, leaving us readers with chopped up stories and apology pages where entire series used to be. And of course, many of these stories have themes of oppression, restricted communication, and discrimination by corporations and government.
Webcomic creators sometimes publish print editions of their work. However, after finding printers that will do the job and after figuring out how to navigate international shipping obstacles, the creators are not always allowed to market their books. Example: Not only ads but search results are restricted by the US-based sites they're already doing business with.
Mostly, here, I'm talking about LGBTQ books. These have additional problems with distribution in the USA. Printed webcomics are rarely challenged individually by schools or community libraries in the USA, because they rarely are added to public libraries. The titles don't show up on lists when similar works (in themes, character types, or style) are banned. For readers, it's obvious nothing similar will either be purchased if recommended or accepted if donated. Learning which booksellers provide copies then buying for yourself or close friends is often the only way to get or share these works.
There's much more that happens to restrict access to works than the average reader sees.
I read webcomics from creators around the world, including from Ukraine, Russia, Hong Kong, and China. The writers and artists not only have to deal with bombs being dropped on their city, their homes being raided by soldiers or police, arrest from posting their work, and all of the fearful events expected in their individual countries at this time; but they also have to put up with other, supposedly-freer countries' legal battles over who should be allowed to see what content. Hosting sites based in the USA and South Korea censor their work, leaving us readers with chopped up stories and apology pages where entire series used to be. And of course, many of these stories have themes of oppression, restricted communication, and discrimination by corporations and government.
Webcomic creators sometimes publish print editions of their work. However, after finding printers that will do the job and after figuring out how to navigate international shipping obstacles, the creators are not always allowed to market their books. Example: Not only ads but search results are restricted by the US-based sites they're already doing business with.
Mostly, here, I'm talking about LGBTQ books. These have additional problems with distribution in the USA. Printed webcomics are rarely challenged individually by schools or community libraries in the USA, because they rarely are added to public libraries. The titles don't show up on lists when similar works (in themes, character types, or style) are banned. For readers, it's obvious nothing similar will either be purchased if recommended or accepted if donated. Learning which booksellers provide copies then buying for yourself or close friends is often the only way to get or share these works.
There's much more that happens to restrict access to works than the average reader sees.
2Cecrow
Thank you for starting a general topic where maybe we can dig into the core of the argument against book banning. I've been doing some (light) reading lately on the history of censorship of literature in the United States and it discusses some key court cases and statements that were made. Some highlights to share:
"No woman was ever ruined by a book." This was Democrat Jim Walker, opposing an obscenity bill introduced to New York State's legislature in 1923. The bill was defeated.
We cannot allow customs officials "to dictate what the American public may or may not read." This was Senator Bronson M. Cutting of New Mexico in 1930, speaking in the House of Representatives against upholding a 1929 proposal to tighten import standards (James Joyce's Ulysses being a key example at the time.)
In 1933, the American public's support for book banning dropped dramatically, a response to the "chilling spectacle of mass book burnings conducted throughout Nazi Germany in May of 1933." Not the kind of solution I'd wish to see repeated.
In these earlier examples, much of the debate hinged on defining the word "obscene" and what works it should apply to. The case of United States vs. One Book Entitled Ulysses, presided over by Judge John Munro Woolsey of South Carolina, was a milestone in settling this issue. Where its legal definition was "Tending to stir the sex impulses or to lead to sexually impure and lustful thoughts", he ruled that the novel Ulysses, despite its "unusual frankness", did not display "the leer of the sensualist". He went on to say, "Whilst in many places the effect of Ulysses on the reader undoubtedly is somewhat emetic, nowhere does it tend to be an aphrodisiac."
In 1975, the US Supreme Court adopted a new yardstick for identifying obscenity: "Whether to the average person, applying contemporary standards, the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to prurient interests." Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence was subsequently legalized in 1959, and Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller in 1964.
But as the laws were relaxed, there was a dramatic increase in hardcore and softcore pornography in various formats. A legal backlash was in the offing. in 1973 in the case of Miller vs. California, the Supreme Court carried a 5-4 verdict that henceforth "local communities" could ban books that are "patently offensive" and "do not have a serious literary, artistic or scientific value." But what is a local community: a state, a town, a county ...?
The head of Random House said, following this 1973 decision, "It seems strange that now, 40 years later, we have to start all over again."
Here is where the history I read ended, maybe someone else can summarize highlights from the next fifty years. Clearly obscenity is no longer at the heart of the issue (although some who favour book banning might categorize it as such) as much as the content of sex education and depictions of sexual orientation.
"No woman was ever ruined by a book." This was Democrat Jim Walker, opposing an obscenity bill introduced to New York State's legislature in 1923. The bill was defeated.
We cannot allow customs officials "to dictate what the American public may or may not read." This was Senator Bronson M. Cutting of New Mexico in 1930, speaking in the House of Representatives against upholding a 1929 proposal to tighten import standards (James Joyce's Ulysses being a key example at the time.)
In 1933, the American public's support for book banning dropped dramatically, a response to the "chilling spectacle of mass book burnings conducted throughout Nazi Germany in May of 1933." Not the kind of solution I'd wish to see repeated.
In these earlier examples, much of the debate hinged on defining the word "obscene" and what works it should apply to. The case of United States vs. One Book Entitled Ulysses, presided over by Judge John Munro Woolsey of South Carolina, was a milestone in settling this issue. Where its legal definition was "Tending to stir the sex impulses or to lead to sexually impure and lustful thoughts", he ruled that the novel Ulysses, despite its "unusual frankness", did not display "the leer of the sensualist". He went on to say, "Whilst in many places the effect of Ulysses on the reader undoubtedly is somewhat emetic, nowhere does it tend to be an aphrodisiac."
In 1975, the US Supreme Court adopted a new yardstick for identifying obscenity: "Whether to the average person, applying contemporary standards, the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to prurient interests." Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence was subsequently legalized in 1959, and Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller in 1964.
But as the laws were relaxed, there was a dramatic increase in hardcore and softcore pornography in various formats. A legal backlash was in the offing. in 1973 in the case of Miller vs. California, the Supreme Court carried a 5-4 verdict that henceforth "local communities" could ban books that are "patently offensive" and "do not have a serious literary, artistic or scientific value." But what is a local community: a state, a town, a county ...?
The head of Random House said, following this 1973 decision, "It seems strange that now, 40 years later, we have to start all over again."
Here is where the history I read ended, maybe someone else can summarize highlights from the next fifty years. Clearly obscenity is no longer at the heart of the issue (although some who favour book banning might categorize it as such) as much as the content of sex education and depictions of sexual orientation.
