Tennessee School Board Bans Holocaust Graphic Novel

[Toni]

Anyone have a link to the language of this ban? (I hate doing searches on my phone. )
I'm curious if we applied this new standard to the bible, how it would fair....

It'll fare fine, really.
They left an out.

They'll just say the Bible's depictions of rape, violence, genocide, mass murder, and women with lovers who are hung like a mule is necessary. Not the same thing at all.

I don't see an out here--

But it's GOD'S WORD! And GOD'S WORD tells us that GOD'S WORD is appropriate for instruction. Any word in there would not be in there iff'n it wasn't part of His ineffable plan.
Thus, necessary.

What public school teaches the Bible?

When I was in public school, I had a class "The Bible as Literature".

Me, too. Or my school offered it. I didn't take it--it was targeted at the slower kids. And no, I'm not making that up or saying it to be sly.

 

[TomC]

Me, too. Or my school offered it. I didn't take it--it was targeted at the slower kids. And no, I'm not making that up or saying it to be sly.

Heh.
12 years of Catholic education here. Religion was a core requirement, one class a day every semester for 12 years.

Comparing what I was learning in Religion with what I was learning across the hall in Math and Science left me an atheist.

Tom

 

[Elixir]

 

[ZiprHead]

Me, too. Or my school offered it. I didn't take it--it was targeted at the slower kids. And no, I'm not making that up or saying it to be sly.

Heh.
12 years of Catholic education here. Religion was a core requirement, one class a day every semester for 12 years.

Comparing what I was learning in Religion with what I was learning across the hall in Math and Science left me an atheist.

Tom

In my Lutheran school we studied the bible and the religion far more than history, unless it was the white-washed history of Martin Luther.

 

[Toni]

We learned very little history and most of it had to do with wars and generals. My US history ( required course) teacher tried to talk me into taking world history but since he couldn’t explain why it was that history books ignored the contributions of women with the exception of Dolly Madison, Betsy Ross, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Carrie Nation, I didn’t see how world history would be any better. He tried to make it up to me by waxing poetic about Mrs. Wilson taking over when her husband had a stroke but nope, I wasn’t having it and took another art class instead. My ‘art teacher’ wasn’t much of an art teacher but he didn’t stop me from doing what I wanted. Didn’t reach me anything, either but he didn’t get in my way.

 

[Politesse]

What is the "right age" to learn about the Shoah? About nudity? About violence?

It's a weird world when we think nothing at all about murdering kids if we disagree politically with their nation's political stance, or simply letting them die right here at home if they're born poor and can't afford meds, but warning them ahead of time that this could happen to them, that children are considered valid subjects for political violence by most of the adults around them, is "age inappropriate" and might scare them. It is, and it will, but so was the Holocaust, and it should. It should not be forgotten, nor white-washed to seem less harsh than it was because it makes Mommy and Daddy uncomfortable when they come home from school with anxiety or tough questions.

 

[Jarhyn]

What is the "right age" to learn about the Shoah? About nudity? About violence?

It's a weird world when we think nothing at all about murdering kids if we disagree politically with their nation's political stance, or simply letting them die right here at home if they're born poor and can't afford meds, but warning them ahead of time that this could happen to them, that children are considered valid subjects for political violence by most of the adults around them, is "age inappropriate" and might scare them. It is, and it will, but so was the Holocaust, and it should. It should not be forgotten, nor white-washed to seem less harsh than it was because it makes Mommy and Daddy uncomfortable when they come home from school with anxiety or tough questions.

I was at the St. Paul Science Museum the other day, showing a housemate the rex skeletons and such and looking at the trivial science demonstrations and cool stuff.

Then we took a walk through the racism exhibit and someone asked "what is discrimination?"

About that age, I think.

I ugly cried just overhearing that question over the fact that ugliness has to pour into someone so that they can understand enough to fight it's momentum.

But it does have to happen.

 

[repoman]

 

[ZiprHead]

View attachment 37129

And Roma, gypsies, gays, the disabled, etc., etc..

 

[Politesse]

As a gay man myself, I'm not going to jump on a Jewish person or organization for not considering us equal partners in victimhood during those times. Yes, we suffered greatly under the German regime. But there's a reason why it's called the Holocaust. Jews were always its primary targets, and they died and were imprisoned in numbers beyond imagining. The other eugenic efforts were side projects next to the deepset racial hatred that fueled German (and international) political and financial support for Hitler's regime. Even if well intentioned, trying to universalize the Nazi project as "evil" rather than treating it as a real political project with concrete goals that many remain sympathetic to, mythologizing them as supernaturalesque demons rather than finding them in the actions and rhetoric of their direct intellectual descendants, puts us at much greater risk of repeating their mistakes. I can fathom why Goldberg said what she did, but I understand also why she has been criticized for it. As to the quote here, ponder the source, and why Spencer of all people might leap on the chance to take the focus away from the project of ethnic cleansing that occupied a phenomenal amount of continental Europe's energy and investment for eight terrible years.

 

[Jarhyn]

As a gay man myself, I'm not going to jump on a Jewish person or organization for not considering us equal partners in victimhood during those times. Yes, we suffered greatly under the German regime. But there's a reason why it's called the Holocaust. Jews were always its primary targets, and they died and were imprisoned in numbers beyond imagining. The other eugenic efforts were side projects next to the deepset racial hatred that fueled German (and international) political and financial support for Hitler's regime. Even if well intentioned, trying to universalize the Nazi project as "evil" rather than treating it as a real political project with concrete goals that many remain sympathetic to, mythologizing them as supernaturalesque demons rather than finding them in the actions and rhetoric of their direct intellectual descendants, puts us at much greater risk of repeating their mistakes. I can fathom why Goldberg said what she did, but I understand also why she has been criticized for it. As to the quote here, ponder the source, and why Spencer of all people might leap on the chance to take the focus away from the project of ethnic cleansing that occupied a phenomenal amount of continental Europe's energy and investment for eight terrible years.

I never quite thought about the defenestration of the Nazis in literature quite in this light before.

It makes them a cartoon villain rather than the guy next door, despite the fact that the guy next door who flies a trump flag is clearly the same thing as whatever made the Nazis bad.

Yesterday I was out to lunch and we were talking about how it's happening again: genocide in China, overtures of war from Russia, and now a political civil war brewing here at home?

It's all going to fucking happen AGAIN!

 

[Politesse]

Yeah, my guy and I have our passports ready. What's not so clear is where the hell to go.

 

[Jarhyn]

Yeah, my guy and I have our passports ready. What's not so clear is where the hell to go.

World war 3 will not spare anyone. It will cover the world, be everywhere, and exercise the weapons that will destroy our planet.

The place to go when it starts is the location of the nearest, most strategically useful gun with which to shoot and kill fascists and defend freedom.

Maybe at the end of it all, the dump fight will have freed us from the unilateral desire to aggression once and for all, even if it has also freed us from the conveniences of modern life forever

 

[bilby]

Yeah, my guy and I have our passports ready. What's not so clear is where the hell to go.

World war 3 will not spare anyone. It will cover the world, be everywhere, and exercise the weapons that will destroy our planet.

The place to go when it starts is the location of the nearest, most strategically useful gun with which to shoot and kill fascists and defend freedom.

Maybe at the end of it all, the dump fight will have freed us from the unilateral desire to aggression once and for all, even if it has also freed us from the conveniences of modern life forever

Nah, that's not been plausible since the 1990s.

World War three will likely kill billions, but there will be plenty of neutral countries who will suffer no direct casualties, and whose population will see no more than a bit of economic hardship.

As long as you steer clear of the major northern hemisphere powers, you'll probably be OK.

Though the time to move is now. The longer you leave it, the less likely it is that any of the safer places will still be admitting refugees.

 

[Jarhyn]

Yeah, my guy and I have our passports ready. What's not so clear is where the hell to go.

World war 3 will not spare anyone. It will cover the world, be everywhere, and exercise the weapons that will destroy our planet.

The place to go when it starts is the location of the nearest, most strategically useful gun with which to shoot and kill fascists and defend freedom.

Maybe at the end of it all, the dump fight will have freed us from the unilateral desire to aggression once and for all, even if it has also freed us from the conveniences of modern life forever

Nah, that's not been plausible since the 1990s.

World War three will likely kill billions, but there will be plenty of neutral countries who will suffer no direct casualties, and whose population will see no more than a bit of economic hardship.

As long as you steer clear of the major northern hemisphere powers, you'll probably be OK.

Though the time to move is now. The longer you leave it, the less likely it is that any of the safer places will still be admitting refugees.

It's weird having talks about this sort of thing. Making plans of where to go, what to take, how to get there and what to do once we are there.

 

[Politesse]

Yeah, my guy and I have our passports ready. What's not so clear is where the hell to go.

World war 3 will not spare anyone. It will cover the world, be everywhere, and exercise the weapons that will destroy our planet.

The place to go when it starts is the location of the nearest, most strategically useful gun with which to shoot and kill fascists and defend freedom.

Maybe at the end of it all, the dump fight will have freed us from the unilateral desire to aggression once and for all, even if it has also freed us from the conveniences of modern life forever

Nah, that's not been plausible since the 1990s.

World War three will likely kill billions, but there will be plenty of neutral countries who will suffer no direct casualties, and whose population will see no more than a bit of economic hardship.

As long as you steer clear of the major northern hemisphere powers, you'll probably be OK.

Though the time to move is now. The longer you leave it, the less likely it is that any of the safer places will still be admitting refugees.

It's weird having talks about this sort of thing. Making plans of where to go, what to take, how to get there and what to do once we are there.

It's prudent. No one ever thinks their regime is about to fall.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

 

[southernhybrid]

I read an opinion piece in the NYTImes this morning, written by a native of Tennessee, who opposes all book banning. She said that Maus has become the number one seller on Amazon and that there are some organizations who are giving free copies of the book to any child who wants one. I don't have time to find the link right now, as I'm heading out. I guess that sometimes banning books helps increase book sales.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Interview with the author. It is interesting because he responds to some of the points from the board and others.

 

[TomC]

I guess that sometimes banning books helps increase book sales.

That's what I think.
You can't effectively ban books in the internet world. Efforts like this are more of an advertising campaign, like it or not.

As the openly gay owner of an art/frame shop downtown, I used to joke about getting Westboro Baptist Church to come picket my store.
Tom