Republicans banning books
The Nazis burned books. But the Republicans are more civilized; they’re just banning them.
Republicans claim they’re preventing the kind of fascistic indoctrination the Nazis practiced. They insist they’re only helping parents protect their kids.
On Morning Edition last month, NPR featured the crusade that one parent, Katie Gates, launched to ban Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, And You. Her daughter’s teacher assigned this book for an AP language and composition class. Gates subjectively found it “anti-American” and tried unsuccessfully to get two curriculum committees to ban it.
Her last resort – the school board. Last November, Republicans swept the elections, taking control from Democrats. Those GOP candidates campaigned on parental rights and stopping what they call liberal indoctrination in schools. Enough Republicans agreed with Gates, who welcomed the decision to pull the book.
This is how Republicans are indoctrinating children with White supremacist ideology, using “parental rights” as their Trojan Horse. And no, their Orwellian projection and gaslighting are not lost on them. Getting away with that emboldens and makes these parents feel clever.
For the record, though, it’s invariably the case that the Republican moms leading this crusade have never read the books they’re trying to ban. The mere rumor that a book is about slavery, racism, homosexuality, or transgender is all it takes for them to jump into action.
In other words, they can’t be bothered even to judge a book by its cover. All of which suggests their ulterior motive might be to make everyone illiterate like them.
So, should Democrats fight back?
Viscerally, fighting fire with fire seems like a categorical imperative. For every “liberal” book Republicans get banned, Democrats should mirror their strategy to get a “conservative” book banned.
Indeed, it would seem divinely inspired to do unto these self-righteous Republicans what they do unto others. However, doing so would violate the key tenet of Michelle Obama’s Democratic catechism: “When they go low, we go high.”
Moreover, retaliating in kind would only lead to the mutually assured dumbing down of public education for all school kids.
How to combat banning books
The Nazis got away with burning books because they were only on paper back then. Today, technology offers so many ways to read that banning books is like playing whac-a-mole.
Of course, the surest way to get a kid to read a book is to tell them their parents want it banned. And, for old-school kids who prefer hard copies, local bookstores would welcome the notoriety of selling or loaning banned books.
Hell, Democratic “Moms for Education” can upstage Republican “Moms for Liberty” by starting public reading programs that feature banned books for community discussions. Some kids might find attending those discussions even more subversive than going to a rave concert.
Bringing sanity back to school boards
Democrats can fight fire with fire through grassroots mobilization, much like the Republicans. Republicans are mobilizing to seize school boards using the Trojan Horse of “parental rights.” Democrats should mobilize to take them back. And they should cite parental concerns for their children’s right to a comprehensive education, not whitewashed with white supremacist propaganda.
We go high by decrying Republicans for wielding universal “parental rights” partisan cudgel. So here’s to putting an end to this ludicrous book-banning charade.
America needs political enlightenment, not partisan education. And yes, I fully appreciate the oxymoron of associating ‘enlightenment’ with today’s politics.