Conservative activists, led by a local pastor and outspoken Israel advocate, pushed the district, Mission CISD, to excise books mostly about gender, sexuality and race. Their demands represented an extreme version of a nationwide culture war over books that has played out in recent years — and ensnared a number of books with Jewish themes.
In Mission, the long list of books on the chopping block includes a recent illustrated adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary; both volumes of Art Spiegelman’s Holocaust graphic memoir “Maus”; “The Fixer,” Bernard Malamud’s novel about a historical instance of antisemitic blood libel; and “Kasher in the Rye,” a ribald memoir by Jewish comedian Moshe Kasher.
I’m definitely not for banning books, but couldn’t you say the same thing about news media? Or Facebook memes? Those “get you to think”.
We should only be banning things that promote intolerance because there will never be an end to the bannings, there will always be some witch to hunt somewhere.
To answer your question, yes it is the saying the same thing, that is why banning books is so stupid. A book, movie, TV show, meme, or news report isn’t necessarily going to change my mind but it might make me think about something from a perspective I didn’t consider before.
I don’t support banning memes or the news either, but they aren’t under attack currently.