In today's society, inappropriate content is revealed to citizens constantly. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury gives a great example dealing with censorship. In the book, it shows a society that burns books because they feel that books cause a corrupt society but Montag, a firefighter, tries to turn around the law and fights for the rights of books. In order to have a strong society, we need censorship.
Censorship can be used because of offensive, sensitive, harmful, or objectionable speech/ideas. In life, censorship is used a lot, more than people think. It also affects lives too. People barely notice it, or care for it, but censorship is there. Censorship has been used for a long time, it has a lot of history.
One instance was in 2011 when a reprint of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn replaced the N-word with the word slave (Patai). The book was needlessly censored in order to allow people to be more comfortable, like in the novel. The word though was relevant to that time and people need to be aware of the type of thinking during that time to fully understand the novel. Another time, a student in Ohio during 2012 put a political flyer on her dorm but was told to remove it, or be disciplined (Patai). Eventually, the university relented and allowed it, but there was still some fight in order to have free speech rights.
Censorship prohibits knowledge and information. Censorship is congress attempting to ban specific parts of songs, books, movies, etc. that may contain damaging, or explicit context. A book trying to be banned because of censorship is Night by Elie Wiesel. This book talks about the Holocaust from a victim’s point of view.
One modern day example of censorship for a good reason is in Mark Twain’s book, Huckleberry Finn. Several years ago the “n” word was replaced to slave because many people were uncomfortable with how often the word appeared; 219 times to be precise (Moore, M. T., 2011). One of the big reasons the word was replaced was because of teachers complaints about parents and students saying the book was “injurious” and “hurtful” (Moore, M. T., 2011). Alan Gribben, professor of English at Auburn University-Montgomery says “When the younger reader is staring at that word five times on a given page and the instructor is saying, 'Mark Twain didn't mean this and you have to read it with an appreciation of irony,' you're asking a lot of a younger reader (Moore, M. T., 2011).” Another reason why some are pro censorship is because they think certain media can contaminate minds of people (H, 2015).
Don’t censor To Kill a Mockingbird Rosa Parks once said, “Racism is still with us. But it is up to us to prepare our children for what they have to meet, and, hopefully, we shall overcome.” In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird the author Harper Lee uses the n-word 48 times and negro 54 times. This alone could cause readers to feel uncomfortable, along with the vulgar language and references to sexual activities. Some people may think that the best solution to these problems are to take out these words and censor the whole book.
As previously stated, Ray Bradbury deals with some issues of censorship in his book Fahrenheit 451. In this novel the entire population is controlled and censored and things are terrible because of it. As said in the book. “We are living in a time when flowers are trying to live off flowers, instead of growing on food rain and black loam.”. It means we need to read books and learn to truly grow instead of just living off each other.
The inadequacy of censorship was just part of the reason leading to the bombardment of news coverage. However, the underlying reason was the war itself. Why did Americans protest the war? When the first coffin was sent home, they considered that was a symbol of heroic sacrifice. Nevertheless, when many of them were returned, inherently, many questions were asked.
“Writers want to talk about creation, and censorship is anti-creation” (The New Yorker). Censorship is defined as the prohibition of a book or a film because of obscene, violent, racist or any other offensive content. Censorship is a threat for many reasons, because it gives authors constraints and limits that they have to respect in order to avoid getting banned. The problem is that society does not appreciate the hidden meaning or reality of these books. For example, Of Mice and Men is a book written by John Steinbeck which is banned because of racial slurs and violence, a normal behavior during the Great Depression, the time when the book takes place.
Censorship is another word for banning, the government/libraries/schools are keeping these books away from the public. Students should be able to read what they please, and they should not be stopped from doing
Censorship in History: Non-Beneficial Environment for Students Historical truths are at stake. States and schools are murdering U.S. history by either changing it in textbooks or not teaching it all. They’re making it disappear. Censorship of history textbooks in the U.S hides important details and truths from the students. It also gives students false impressions of U.S. history.
Censorship is another word for banning, the government/libraries/schools are keeping these books away from the public. Students should be able to read what they please, and they should not be stopped from doing
There are many reasons why various organizations and people are censoring different kinds of topics; some people say it’s the right thing to do and others think its controversial to the first amendment.
Censorship is a serious matter that has been discussed through the years. People are divided on whether censorship should be in school libraries or if it should not. Books such as “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”, “The Autobiography of Malcolm X" and many more have been greatly affected because of book banning. Not everyone has the same style, which causes outrage when certain books are banned. For example, if one book was banned and people prefered that book, it can make the community furious.
I am undecided for Freedom of Speech. There are plenty of good and bad qualities, and as much as there are pros there are also an equal amount of cons to freedom of speech. According to the first amendment, we the people have the freedom of speech which allows us the right to speak freely without censorship. Freedom of speech is not absolute in any country and the right is commonly subject to limitations, such as on “hate speech”. There are many pros and cons to freedom of speech, which is why I am only discussing three pros and cons, that I find that argues the opposite side, to the point it made me undecided on free speech.
