The Intellectual Freedom has been remarkably silent toward me this week. Probably too many other things in my tiny little brain. Or perhaps I've been trying to find a topic other than the one which keeps drifting to the fore when listening to lectures and reading readings and other students' blogs. It is going to be difficult to say what I'm thinking without offending, but I might as well try. Although, coherence may be a greater problem than offense.
It starts with looking at one of texts, by James LaRue, where he talks about the various generations and how they look at censorship/protecting children from information. We of the baby boomer generation are tending toward being helicopter parents, who somehow expect children to spring fully formed from the protective cocoon of our skulls, fully armoured and prepared to deal with everything the world brings.
And then my thoughts drift to "discussions" I have with certain of my friends over the role of God in America. Most of these people tend to feel that a lot of organizations, including libraries, are trying to take God out of people's daily lives. Which inevitably leaves me to point out that "In God We Trust" didn't appear on the dollar until the 1950s...
Which, unless I'm wrong, was about the time the FBI came into being. And a week doesn't go past in this course, where we don't have at least one mention of the FBI or other authority figures trying to circumvent the ALA's intellectual freedom polices for reasons of greater or lesser validity. With differing degrees of sucess.
Leading me to the thought that this all seems to tie together, as by far, the largest groups trying to censor books in libraries identify themselves as Christian, and have religious belief and arguments behind thier desire to limit what we can read.
All of which gets me to the question of whether we are, as a culture, as "liberal" and culturally aware (of ourselves as well as the Other) as we think. Or, is the urge for censorship even greater now than it once was? Too much information perhaps?
I think the problem lies in trying to define all Americans as one group. There are certainly liberal Americans and there are certainly Americans who equate being liberal to being godless and un-patriotic. We are a nation that forgets how diverse we are at times.
ReplyDeleteI watched a special on HBO the other night that followed the John McCain campaign trail during the three months leading up to the election. I realize our nation is divided along some pretty defined ideological lines but was AMAZED at some of the comments I heard from the people featured in the program. The show featured Americans from the south as well as from Indiana and a few other eastern states. So many of the individuals interviewed define being "American" as being Christian, self supporting, independant and although it wasn't said in direct terms, WHITE.
I live in the pacific northwest in the Portland area and so during the election, I had a totally different experience. I was surrounded by people who supported Barak Obama, and never did I hear someone dare to say that they were not ready to vote for a black president. Of course I know plenty of individuals who supported McCain but never for the reasons given in that show.
I am not concluding that there is no one in the Pacific Northwest that did not hold similar views to those in the American south, nor that there is no one in the south that does not hold similar values to Pacific Northwestern "liberals." But there certainly is a different culture that influences behavior, beliefs and accepted social norms.
Americans need to realize that the definition of being American is not so narrowly defined. I do not believe it is possible to say "we Americans" and classify the people in this country in one group. We are made up of very different cultures with very different ideologies influenced by region, ethnic background, and generational differences.
For these reasons, we have our laws to support our freedom of speech. Only the courts can define what it means to freely express ourselves . Each of us has our own definition of how the first amendment should be enforced and if we allow ideologies to dictate, rather than the law, then we our differences will certainly limit the rights of many to fulfill the ideas of a few.
Annie said, "we have our laws to support our freedom of speech." I believe that is where you get the answer for what it means to be American. When that is the definition, I am extremely patriotic. When it means to unknowingly having my phone tapped, then I am not as interested in being a patriotic American, though that, too, is law of sorts. I think part of the problem is that no one is willing to say, "this is what it means to be American." Someone might get their feelings hurt. Someone might not win an election...
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