Farenheit 451

[Bill Ferny]

I should underscore this to make myself clear (because I think my point was lost, at least on me, when I got mired down in that tolerance stuff):

The only principle incompatible with freedom to read any book one wants is the principle that one's own beliefs should be imposed on others.

The problem with this statement is that those nutty people who want to ban fantasy books are using the same argument. These fantasy books, in their minds, by being present in the public schools, is an imposition on them. An argument from toleration becomes a vicious circle, and this circle is the evolution of political correctness.

My personal experience is that censorship works best (if it works at all), when undertaken in a pragmatic way, on a case by case basis, and that each decision is only valid for the time in which it was taken. I think that blanket censorship on the grounds of religion, morality or other tenet, is ultimately destructive and disempowering - and the evidence is that it is often self-defeating.

There is a lot of validity to this method, and I can think of at least one Catholic moral theologian, Timothy E. O’Connell, who would agree with you. Here is the best link I could find to his most recent book (http://www.scu.edu/bannancenter/Explore%20Articles/W1999/Book--text.html) that mentions just such a method, albeit in terms of a whole moral system. However, there are many who would argue that O’Connell, and also you, would put too much emphasis on circumstance at the expense of fundamental principles.

Edit: URL link didn't work.

[ December 07, 2002: Message edited by: Bill Ferny ]