Comments on: The Real Question: Is it Porn?

By: elend

elend — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 23:25:06 +0000

There is a difference between a library not providing a book to its patrons and a library prohibiting any presence of that book on its premises. The first isn’t a ban, the second is. As long as patrons are allowed to bring their own copy into the library and read it there then the book isn’t banned.

By: elend

elend — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 23:17:58 +0000

Actually, no. In the Bible men and women are shown to have different roles of equal importance, but from time to time when men fail to do their job and if women happen not to be as weak as them then women would step up to take care of things. We see this most prominently with Devora in the book of Judges. She is a prophet and national leader, but urges her husband to lead the troops in battle because that’s the job of a man. He refuses and wants her to lead so she agrees to go with him, and as punishment proclaims that all the honors for that battle will fall to women because a man refused to lead and insisted a woman should lead.

By: KatyBee

KatyBee — Mon, 21 May 2012 23:44:27 +0000

Seriously? I would be embarrassed to be a part of any group demanding “We must have our mainstream Mommy Porn!”

By: KatyBee

KatyBee — Mon, 21 May 2012 23:42:12 +0000

Josh wrote ““Fifty Shades of Grey” has quite clearly been officially banned from the library system’s collection.”

What you’re describing could just as easily be written off as “collection development”. Does that make any exclusion of material against a collection development criteria that could possibly be seen as politically motivated a “ban” and thus censorship?

By: Josh

Josh — Tue, 15 May 2012 16:07:48 +0000

Shell, to have an official policy prohibiting a certain type of material means that the library in question is banning it. See the definition of “ban” above, or in any dictionary.

If the library determined that books written by black authors or Chinese authors were outside of the collection’s “scope” and then removed them from the shelves, most people would say those authors have been banned.

I’m not mad 50 Shades is banned at this particular library system. And I do not support pornography in library systems.

The only wave I’m currently riding is the wave of people who cringe when others re-define words like “ban” because they are too intellectually sloppy to make a proper argument.

By: Shell

Shell — Sun, 13 May 2012 19:19:18 +0000

The libraries aren’t banning the books because they don’t like it. They are taking it out of the system because it doesn’t meet the scope of the library. The libraries specifically don’t stock erotica because their patrons/tax payers have had major fights about it in the past. It is the library’s right to not stock erotica, and if you have a problem with that, deal with that problem.

To say that 50 Shades is not erotica would actually be opposing what it was written as. It was specifically intended to BE erotica and it is the main purpose of the story.

Honestly, I’d be a lot angrier if libraries refused to stock all books with sex in it. Do you really want this to be an all or nothing situation? Don’t point fingers at other books that include sex as an addition to the plot as an excuse to stock books where the point is to write as racy sex scenes as possible.

Any yeah, maybe the sex scenes in 50 Shades are bland or vanilla or badly written, maybe there are better sex scenes in other books, but those other books were not released as erotica. 50 Shades WAS released as erotica. If you really want to complain about libraries not stocking it on the basis that it is erotica, then get mad at the publishers for calling it that, because they’re the ones to blame.

By: Shell

Shell — Sun, 13 May 2012 19:11:20 +0000

ACTUALLY, Josh, it isn’t being banned. What is happening here is that the libraries have a policy against erotica. The book is billed as erotica by the author herself. If the author calls it erotica and the library just has a policy not to stock erotica, then yes, it is outside the library’s scope (read: not “banned”). If you want to get mad at a library for not wanting to carry erotica, go ahead, but don’t ride this BS wave of “omg the libraries are banning this book, waaaah” to say that. Just man up and say, “we want porn to be allowed in the library.” Then at least you’d be respectable.

By: Diane Briel

Diane Briel — Sat, 12 May 2012 18:08:34 +0000

My Florida county system does not allow ILL holds on items published in the current year, so that’s not an option

By: Edie Martimucci

Edie Martimucci — Fri, 11 May 2012 17:05:07 +0000

If the public wants it, we get it.

Art and Literature is a reflection of the society at the time.
I purchased “The Baroque World of Fernando Botero” which had very explicit imagery of Abu Gharib. No on has complained.

By: Annoyed With Things

Annoyed With Things — Fri, 11 May 2012 15:51:06 +0000

I believe we all have to take a collective breath, now let it out…slowly, slowly. Good. This is not porn, it is sexually explicit and for adults only (really, what kid would want to read it anyway). I just finished reading the The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo – Yes I Know a day late and a dollar short. Without giving it away, there are several coerced sex scenes, two bruttal rape scenes, incest, and agood bit of plain old healty fun sex. I don’t recall any uproar to ban this book.