The freedom to read whatever you want

If you’ve ever felt challenged by something in a book, then congratulations!

Consider yourself fortunate to have the right to read books, magazines, e-books and other works that make you think about a topic, culture, plight, event or person from a completely different perspective. 

Our Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms ensures that you have the right to pick up any book you desire to read. Not sure that's important in this day and age?
Think censorship is a thing of the past?
WRONG. Sadly, censorship continues to rear its ugly head.

The Canadian Libraries Association published an updated 2011 list of works people have fought to have removed from school curricula and bookshelves in this country during the past ten years.
Those titles included: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Handmaid’s Tale, Lives of Girls and Women, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, and all seven Harry Potter books.

Fortunately, Canadian teachers, librarians, principals, store managers, and others keep standing up to close-minded individuals. Still not convinced that free access to books is essential?

Imagine not being allowed to read Judy Blume, Margaret Atwood, Alice Walker, J.D. Salinger, Mark Twain, Anne Frank, Kurt Vonnegut Jr., Roald Dahl, John Steinbeck, Maurice Sendak, Aldous Huxley, Madeleine L’Engle, Toni Morrison, Mordecai Richler, Salman Rushdie, Harper Lee, Shel Silverstein, William Golding, Ken Follett, or any of the other authors whose works have been banned at one time or another.

Never underestimate the value of intellectual freedom. Having the right to browse libraries, bookstores, personal collections and the Internet, then pick up any book you so desire, well that is

      AWESOME!
 Online bookmark courtesy of Freedom to Read Week (http://www.freedomtoread.ca/),
the Canadian version of Banned Books Week, which our American neighbours
celebrated last week (Sept. 24 to Oct. 1).

Comments

  1. Cindy GMonday, October 03, 2011 7:48:00 am

    Very well said, Lise. We should all be entitled to intellectual freedom.

    Cindy

    ReplyDelete
  2. RachelleMonday, October 03, 2011 9:22:00 am

    Very awesome! And the freedom of getting access to FREE books every week at the library, even cooler! :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. UnknownMonday, October 03, 2011 9:24:00 am

    Thank you, Cindy G. (BTW, I love your movie trailer!)

    Thought you might appreciate a note I just received from another friend and colleague who reads my blog. She replied via email to say:

    Amen! As Voltaire did not actually say but would have approved: « Je ne suis pas d’accord avec ce que vous dites, mais je défendrai jusqu’à la mort votre droit de le dire. »

    ReplyDelete
  4. UnknownMonday, October 03, 2011 10:54:00 am

    I couldn't agree more, Rachelle! And it's great to know you're introducing my niece to the joys of books and libraries at such a young age.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Readers' faves

Any excuse to celebrate (my guest post on 1000 Awesome Friends)

Image
I originally posted the rambling below as my first guest blog entry on 1000AwesomeFriends.org , but I'm also re-posting the text here, where it is searchable. (I've written so many posts that the only way I can only avoid repeats by searching my own site to see if I've written about a topic or simply thought about writing about that subject.) Has your birthday come and gone? Are there no statutory holidays on your horizon? There’s no need to wait for a day off from school or work to let loose and shake things up a bit. Just go ahead, pick a festivity from another nation or culture, then find your own way to mark that occasion. As it is, people around the world wear shamrocks, listen to Irish tunes, and eat and drink green food colouring on March 17th. Do we all have ties to Ireland? No, but that doesn’t stop us from whooping it up on St. Patrick’s Day. It’s easy to find something to celebrate. Take today for example, it’s Cinco de Mayo. That party is no longer just
Read more

Retweets for mental health

Image
In five-cent increments, the twitterverse buzzed with tweets that will make millions of dollars flow to support mental health.  From a social-media metrics perspective, the #BellLetsTalk (French version #BellCause) garnered impressive reach, which rivalled #SOTU for President Obama's State of the Union address. Even by adding the long form (#stateoftheunion), as of this morning there was only a five-million gap between the BellLetsTalk hashtag and the State of the Union hashtags. Impressive. How did it happen? Collective thanks to major leaguers, mobile technology, multitudes of do-gooders and an annual marketing campaign for all the activity on January 28, 2014.  Entertainers like William Shatner, Jann Arden and Ellen Degeneres encouraged their fans to retweet the #BellLetsTalk messages about mental health. Thousands upon thousands of followers responded. Millions in all. Who else helped the cause? Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield. Olympian Clara Hughes. NHL franchis
Read more

Ironing boards with quiet mechanisms

Image
Have you ever used an ironing board with a silent opening mechanism? All the ironing boards I've owned or borrowed have shrieked as though cats were being tortured by the fires of Hell. I can imagine that an ironing board with a quiet mechanism, which doesn't wake up people four houses away, would be AWESOME!
Read more