New Rochelle school board mutilates books to protect children
Now Playing in New Rochelle, "Book, Interrupted"! (Thanks, Robert!)
Students at New Rochelle School High School are going to find it difficult to complete their next assignment: comparing the film adaptation of "Girl, Interrupted" to the best-selling book. In the book, Kaysen recounts her confinement at a Massachussets mental hospital in the 1960's.Pages from the middle of the book have been torn out by the school district after having been deemed "inappropriate" by school officials due to sexual content and strong language. Removed is a scene where the rebellious Lisa (played by Angela Jolie in the movie) encourages Susanna (played by Winona Ryder) to circumvent hospital rules against sexual intercourse by engaging in oral sex instead.
"The material was of a sexual nature that we deemed inappropriate for teachers to present to their students," said English Department Chariperson Leslie Altschul, "since the book has other redeeming features, we took the liberty of bowdlerizing."
"Bowdlerizing is a particularly disturbing form of censorship since it not only suppresses specific content deemed 'objectionable,' but also does violence to the work by removing material that the author thought integral," said Joan Bertin, Executive Director of the National Coalition Against Censorship. "It is a kind of literary fraud perpetrated on an unsuspecting audience."
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Call me a prude, but why should a High School have books that are depicting graphic sex in them anyways? I don't care if it is lesbionic sex or otherwise. ctlly, 'd prfr f ll sx dpctd ws lsbnc n ntr...t s jst s mch sxr, MH (k, nt n th rl wrld, thy r jst s gly s th rst, bt s lng s cn b thnkng f ths tw).
Once we get into the PUBLIC libraries, it is fair game...I don't believe we should get into the business of censoring those, but this is a school. For the most part students do not have a choice about being there, and neither do their parents. Being such, it is held to a higher standard. I'm not talking about excising demons from the Harry Potter books, I'm talking sex...which we KNOW the prudes disagree with.
Slippery slope...yada yada...personally, I would recommend not having it in the schools at all and encouraging students to go to their local public library where they can get the graphic stuff without heed. If someone wants to censor that, I'll support the dissenters.
This is a high school. If the administration thinks that their students wouldn't be having sex were it not for the encouragement of this book, they are deluding themselves.
Kids are having oral sex at 10 years old, fer chrissakes. That book would make them yawn.
And it's a high school, not a grammar school.
Ah the New Rochelle English department has decided to encourage students to read by telling them "this book has naughty bits in it that we're not going to let you see." I'll bet the local bookstores have had a spike in activity as students trying to figure out what exactly was in the missing pages that their teachers were so desperately trying to keep from them.
(Seriously - there's no other purpose to this kind of silliness. If you think the material is inappropriate, don't assign the book. If you think the book has literary value, you don't presume to alter the literary value with your own scissors. But if you want to convince a handful of teenagers to read something, nothing works better than telling them it's full of sex that you're not going to let them see for themselves. The teachers at that school are either idiots or devious masterminds.)
Lesbionic? Were the characters cyborgs?
That would be something. Cyborg lesbians trapped in a mental institution.
The more I read about censorship, the more I feel it should be opt-in, not opt-out.
What I mean is, in general, we live in a society with freedome of expression and freedom of the press, and being FOR those things means also defending content and opinions you object to.
So, in every situation where censorship is requested by someone, the censorship should only happen to those who specifically request it, leaving the "potentially objectionable" content available for everyone else.
For example, the book in question should just be placed in a "censored" section, and parents who object to such content would have to check a box or something similar on some form at the beginning of each school year that puts a particular mark on their child's library card or student ID that blocks them from going into the "censored" section.
Parents that don't check the box (and it will be explicit on the form, not jammed-in with a section of other things, so the parents can't claim ignorance or innattention, later) will let their children go into that censored section, as the library card or student ID will get a different mark or no mark at all.
The same should eventually happen with TV and such: if I don't like filthy content, I should be the one to have to configure my TV to block it. The only obligation on the network's part should be to flag anything they expect to be objectionable, so that TVs set to censor will bleep or obscure that content automatically, letting everyone else enjoy the show in its intended form.
To summarize: censorship should be opt-in, not opt-out.
Wow, I've never heard someone in the process of actively bowdlerizing use the term directly in defense of their actions.
Sex is not a dirty thing, unless you make it a dirty thing. You, and everyone else came into this world through the act of sex. That means your parents had hot steamy sex together.
It's 2008 forcryingoutloud. Don't you think it's a bit bent up that we go anal over the act of lovemaking, but at the meantime, we let our kids play computergames in which they are being taught to work as a team to kill as many people as possible?
@ Cliff Marsiglio - Have you read the book? I haven't. In any case, can you define graphic, and can you say that was depicted in the book was graphic? And where do you draw the line, for that matter? Don't just dismiss the slippery slope argument, cause it's real. Eventually you're going to get a parent or teacher that dissaproves of Catcher in the Rye or Crime and Punishment and had enough sway to have them removed from the curriculum. And to the issue of bowdlerizing, I find it sickening.
If they disliked the book so much, why did they buy it for their library in the first place? You have to wonder if they give the Bible the same treatment considering there are racy passages there too.
@1 - Clif "For the most part students do not have a choice about being there, and neither do their parents. Being such, it is held to a higher standard."
So hold it to higher standards - not lower ones. I would consider censorship, especially ripping out pages, to be lowering standards.
We watched Black Robe in grade 11 christian ethics class and our teacher fast forwarded (and stood in front of) the sex scene. So we all just had to imagine why he was flagellating himself later. All the violence was left intact. How christian. sigh.
As a senior in a public high school- this is kind of pathetic.
Our high-level classes use high-level books. I'm in those classes. Despite living in the Bible Belt, we don't face censorship thanks to a devoted school board. Generally, when one teacher goes out of bounds- or a student- (last year we had a student complain about To Kill A Mockingbird), the general consensus is, eff you, opt out of the class and grow a thicker skin.
In the higher-level classes which do sometimes involve sex or other real-world events in real-world novels, the teacher is warned ahead of time. There's a strong focus on personal responsibility.
Which is the way it should be. I hear more graphic depictions of sex in the hallways, and have been since I was in middle school.
My librarian, when suggesting a novel to me a few months ago, asked quickly- "Wait- what's your classification?" "Senior." "Oh, okay. This is a good book, I just wouldn't suggest it to a freshman."
I have nothing but contempt for people who spend their time censoring sexual content in literature and movies. Sexuality is part and parcel of our humanity and people censor it like it was dirty are essentially calling us all dirty.
I'm going to second the opt-in approach to censorship, with a caveat. I think that it's perfectly reasonable for parents to have input into what materials their children have access to/are required to read, provided the children are young, let's say
Once kids are 14 or older, I think the power of parents to censor material should be progressively weakened, and should almost certainly be moot by the time kids are seniors in high school. If a kid objects to part of the book (or a book in general) and by that point they are unable to say "I find this book objectionable and would like an alternative assignment", we have problems far beyond descriptions of sex.
Also - any censorware, while irritating, provides all kinds of opportunities for creative workarounds. Without barriers, how would we get hackers?
surely once someone is mature enough to constructively criticize literature, they are able too deal with explicit content.
How can you discuss anything meaningful without passion? Creativity demands expletives.
Books have plenty of other lovely redeeming features aside from their text. They make good coasters, they can be used to level uneven furniture, they provide heat when burned, and if the pages are thin enough, they make excellent toilet paper.
It's obvious to me that high schoolers are not ready to know about oral sex. We are doing it absolutely correctly by starting them out with A Shot at Love With Tila Tequila and Grand Theft Auto IV. Because their parents are not there to be apathetic and unknowledgeable about those things when the students are in school, we should instead be making sure to continue the tradition of preaching abstinence, creationism, and vending machines packed with snickers and pepsi.
CLEARLY, several pages in which a young lady is introduced to oral sex is unhealthy, and possibly the MOST unhealthy thing that any young person will be subject to.
I am all for parental involvement. Read what your children are reading and if you disapprove, talk to the teacher about alternatives that might be available for your child, other than that stay the hell out of blocking access to literature.
What this school is doing is even worse. Were I student in this school I would turn my final paper in bowlderized as a form of protest. Whole swaths of text would be blacked out to protect the teachers sensibilities.
This school district should be sued by the copyright holders...when you purchase a book you do not purchase the right to re-edit and re-present it in a way you feel is more appropriate.
Don
I first saw Love, Actually on a plane. Thought it was cute enough to suggest it to my more conservative parents having NO IDEA that there was a movie-long subplot about 2 naked people working as stand ins for a porno.
They cut out that entire subplot on the airplane version.
@ Cliff Marsiglio
@Grimshaw
I don't remember anything graphic about the sex in the book (strong language, yes, graphic sex, no)
In fact, the narrator assumes lesbianism consists of a single act and is confused as to "what exactly it is they do," a position that would probably strike most highschoolers now as quaint.
Stuff kids say while eating lunch in the cafeteria is far more graphic than anything you'll find in the book.
Hmmm wonder what the author thinks of this... and are they watching specially selected excerpts of the movie as well... I'd love to see this blow back right in their faces... are they going to bowdlerise the Bible... after all, there;s some pretty racy bits in there...
and I've never really been able to work out just what Noah's grandson Canaan (or son Ham, very confusing episode) did that was so abhorrent that he was effectively cast out... something was lost in translation there...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_Ham
and as for Onan...
"LESBIONIC" sex. The mind reels...
www.dictionary.reference.com/browse/bowdlerize
Public schools are essentially government institutions right? So wouldn't think be a case of government funded censorship?
Now, even if that is NOT the case. Someone RIPPING pages from a book needs to be horsewhipped along with the idiots out there that are burning books.
The book is partly about the issue of the personal freedom the patients are deprived of. Including sex.
The same "institutional reflexes" discussed in the book are at work here to censor the discussion of these "reflexes".
Very war-on-terror-esque: the "Do not joke about bombs" sign implicitly tells you to not joke about the "Do not joke about bombs" sign.
When I was in high school the edition of Hamlet we were given in English class was bowdlerized. Yes, really, Hamlet. So, our teacher read us the omitted passages and had us write them into the margins. As a result, the "racy" material was covered in exquisite detail.
I loved that teacher.
Wow... Ironic! When I was in H.S., the library was the best place to meet during school for just that type of meeting.
Hooray for denial!
@ GuidoDavid
Thats how I read it...Jolie is not human because no woman can be sooo fine.
@ Grimshaw
I saw the movie...I liked the movie. Don't remember much about it anymore though other than that (I think it might be on my shelf somewhere with all the other DVDs I buy and never watch). I'd probably like the book. Would I want my kids to check it out without my knowledge? Well...if they were in High School, I wouldn't care...if they were younger I would. Other parents might feel differently.
Again, *SCHOOL* is not something one can opt in or out of. You can elect not to go to a public library...but you might not have this choice in a school. I find the idea of bowdlerizing far more offensive than just telling kids if they want to read this, GO TO THE PUBLIC LIBRARY.
The slippery slope is non-existant. If I as a parent want to allow my child to read something, I will. This is not censorship...a parent has ALWAYS had the right to tell kids what they can and can't read / do / say until emancipation. Of course, I wouldn't -- but some backwards people still believe in totalitarianism in their homes. I find it wrong, but one of the most fundamental freedoms is allowing parents the right to raise their children as they see fit so long as it doesn't fall under abuse (legal, not your perceived version of it).
@ AGF
This is our higher standards. There are things that are appropriate for school and things that are not. My standards for what I find offensive would be pretty high...I'm not shocked by much. But I know other parents that feel differently.
As for allowing violence, but not sex...yeah...I find this hypocritical. I love sex...I hate violence. Not interested in violent works...am interested in the other stuff. YET...it is a societal norm and the other stuff can be found pretty easily and the minute someone tells me it can't be, I will be up in arms...just not going to stand in the way of a school acting as temporary guardians in the way that parents want them to. Two different standards here at work...unless you are coming into class with porn, I doubt that anyone is going to even complain that you have a book like this that you brought in from the street.
Way to tell the kids that their teachers and possibly their parents don't take them seriously.
The little litigator inside me is thinking that a case could be made by the copyright holder for infringement by the production of a derivative work. By intentionally removing a broad swath of the story they have created a derivative work; as it was a registered work that was infringed, they could be liable for hefty damages.
@ Clif Marsiglio -
"Again, *SCHOOL* is not something one can opt in or out of." What about homeschooling? Then you can make real decisions about what your kid learns, and not have those decisions impact on anyone else.
"The slippery slope is non-existant. If I as a parent want to allow my child to read something, I will. This is not censorship...a parent has ALWAYS had the right to tell kids what they can and can't read / do / say until emancipation." When you give the power to remove a book from the curriculum, again to use Catcher in the Rye as example as an often challenged work in school's (and public libraries) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Catcher_in_the_Rye), it is censorship, as the purpose of including the book in the curriculum is not just for the student's to read the book, but to discuss the book in the context of a classroom and hopefully learn something from their fellow students and teacher, that they may not have learned if they had read the book on their own and not had or sought out the opportunity to discuss it with others. The slippery slope that I'm talking about is the slope that will lead to further works being removed from curriculum because someone doesn't want them there - what slope are you talking about?
"When I was in high school the edition of Hamlet we were given in English class was bowdlerized. Yes, really, Hamlet."
You shouldn't be surprised. The eponymous Dr. Bowdler was primarily concerned with Shakespeare.
Here you go: The Family Shakespeare, by William Shakespeare; Thomas Bowdler, ed.
[Changed your blockquote to quotes to see if that was breaking the layout in the sidebar. Carry on! – Joel]
That's disgusting. If the book is so objectionable that they have to tear it apart to protect students, why do they have it in stock in the first place? Ohh dear. If you're going to ask someone to write about a book, at least let them read the book in its entirety first. If I was a teacher at that school, I would have some serious concerns with the management.
@2, I'm sure the schools know what kind of things their students are getting up to. The problem is when a kid gets caught and their first response is, "well, it was what they were teaching us in the school". I see this as a liability issue more than anything else.
Couldn't agree more with the opt-in policy towards censorship in public schools. One (tangentially) relevant real-life example...
My girlfriend teaches 4th grade at a progressive-leaning public magnet school. 4th grade is the first grade offered at this school, so early in the schoolyear the 4th grade teachers show a video to their classes about families-- the idea being families come in many different forms: some kids have one parent, some kids live with their grandparents, some kids have two dads or two moms, etc etc. Despite some obvious corniness (it is an educational video after all), it's a pretty cute little movie and does an excellent job of handling an important topic in an honest and respectful manner.
But because the movie includes families with gay parents, the 4th grade teachers have to send home permission letters to parents which ask the parents to check a box if they're ok with their kid watching said video. My girlfriend had a problem with this, because gay parents, y'know, exist and everything. But she had to jump through tons of loops just to change the language of the permission letter so only parents who object to their kids watching the video have to check a box.
Now I know this is hardly the same issue as bowdlerizing a book that may or may not have "graphic" sexual content. But the point is about affecting a culture change. The onus to speak up should be on those who want to do the censoring, not on those who are, after all, upholding a constitutional amendment.
There is nothing wrong with wanting to keep graphic material out of a (underage) audiences hands. There is something wrong with destroying books.
If the school board deems part of the book inappropriate then they should find another book to read. There are plenty of great works appropriate for high school students and do not contain sex. Choose an appropriate book. Dont try to make an inappropriate book OK by censoring it. (you cant have your cake and eat it to)
Pick a book that you don't need to alter. 1984? Animal Farm? Lord of the Flies? Give them some Shakespeare damnit! If you want them to read challenging literature its out there for the taking. And wouldn't Girl Interrupted work better as a 'first year university English class book'?
Its easier, smarter, and more responsible in every way to just pick a different book.
My wife subbed at a junior high school for a week. In one of the classes a girl was reading an Olympia Press pornographic novel (that's how long ago it was). Between classes she asked the vice-principal what she should do about it. He shrugged, "At least she's reading."
I come down on the "Use the book, or don't use it, but don't butcher it" line.
Not having kids, I'm not qualified to comment on what is or isn't appropriate -- but depiction of consentual, caring sex is a lot less likely to harm the little house-apes than depiction of violence, which we take for granted. Our society has some serious displacement psycoses...
public schools should not censor. Those whose parents wish ignorant and brainwashed already have their own bigot factories (ie: religious schools).
@ Grimshaw
I don't care is Catcher In The Rye is not available in high schools or not. It is a shame that it isn't in some, but life is not going to end if it isn't. Again, go to the PUBLIC LIBRARY...I will support causes and donate money (and have before) to keep these places uncensored. I have bought library editions (not cheap) of books that I knew were not going to be something someone ordered on their own for libraries.
But the school system is different. Why? Because it is. I'm sorry you can't see that having to go to some place else that is free and open and allows kids to get the same thing and owned by the gov't is censorship. Much better books and generally a wider selection there anyways.
"liberty of bowdlerizing."
So, they have the liberty to restrict other people's liberties?
Sounds about right to me.
Did anyone else find "the liberty of bowdlerizing" to be a particularly hilarious turn of phrase?
When I was in High School, one of the books we had to read was 'Agaguk', a novel about an Inuit man by a Quebec author (I grew up in QC).
There were several explicit, descriptive sex scenes between Agaguk and his wife, even a scene where a man gets lynched by a tribe and the women sever and eat the man's privates. We were 14 years-old and, as far as I know, nobody ended up traumatized for life aside from the initial 'eeeeeeeew!' reaction and a few giggles.
Oh yeah, what a good idea, opt-in censorship for your kids, so you can decide what your kids world looks like.
I want my kid to be taught by sex-less eunuchs about unicorns running through daisy fields in a world where everyone is friends and the lion and the gazelle walk with each other.
Reality check: Control is an illusion. The more you try to hold on, the more they slip away. Your kids make their own reality. The best service you could do to them is to acknowledge and respect that. Oh yeah, and concern yourself with your own quest for happiness.
@ Clif - What books do you think should be taught in schools, then? Whose going to decide which books are acceptable or not? You would seriously have no problem if another parent decided that a book you were okay with was removed from the curriculum, because they don't like it? If i've misconstrued what you were saying then I apologize.
And no need to apologize to me - I am aware that schools and libraries are different public institutions (maybe that comes with my being a librarian...) but censorship in schools does exist, and just because you say that it's not censorship doesn't mean that you're right.
http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-9215/library.htm
but depiction of consensual, caring sex is a lot less likely to harm the little house-apes than depiction of violence
I agree. However, this is a school. And from my understanding a group of 40 or so students will read the book and perform analysis of structure/characters/whatever. YOU as a parent are allowed to expose your child to sexual content of an appropriate nature. The school has obviously stated that it finds providing sexually graphic material to students (at least when they do it) unethical.
Wether or not sex is harmful to the psyche is not the question. Its that the book contained literature that the board was uncomfortable with presenting to high school students.
As long as a quality alternative book is available
(And there are tons of though provoking books not involving sex). Censorship is not ok. Its either appropriate or inappropriate. The book should be unchanged. This is a public SCHOOL not a public library. Censorship is wrong - choosing a less controversial book is not censorship. The student can still read the controversial book in whole. As long as the educational and philosophical integrity of the program endures then i dont care what book they read - as long as its unabridged and complete.
If one of these kids wanted to read girl interrupted then they can go buy the book or go to a public library. It is not the responsibility of the public educator to "Blow the little square's minds with some controversial socially up heaving material" Its their responsibility to educate the students on Form/Structure/Character/whatever. They have no obligation to expose readers to material that is unnecessarily sexual or violent.
The question is not "Why did they censor this book?" its "why couldn't they replace it?"
There is plenty of reading material that does not need to be censored and serves the exact same purpose.
I am the person who broke this story in New Rochelle, NY.
Before posting this story I went to a bookstore over the weekend and read the "inappropriate" pages. I would clarify something here that seems to be a point of confusion in the comments.
The pages ripped out contain a scene in the day room at a mental hospital where Lisa (Angelina Jolie) is talking to Susanna (Winona Ryder). There is NO SEX in the chapter at all, merely a discussion of it. The words "f---" and "b--- j--" are used several times. The scene is not in the film.
The scene is hardly a gratuitously vulgar scene. It is in there for a reason - Lisa, looking to recruit Susanna into her acts of rebellion against the hospital staff, encourages Susanna to dump her boyfriend who "never visits anyway", and take a boyfriend from among the male patients. Lisa explains how by engaging in oral sex rather than sexual intercourse, Susanna can have sex in between the 15 minute security checks. This scene is part of the plot development and character development (for both Lisa and Susanna). Susanna eventually DOES rebel against the staff by leaving the hospital without leave; she escapes with Lisa.
The book was assigned to my son. The class is supposed to do a comparative analysis for the book and film; one point of comparison would be scenes like this one from the book that are not in the film.
This is part of a broader pattern of suppression of rights in New Rochelle schools.
My daughter was the editor-in-chief of the high school newspaper. She was required to meet with the principal before each edition was published for what is called "prior review". The principal has the authority to edit or spike any story in the school paper.
Members of the public who appear before the school board to speak at City Hall are told they may not mention or indirectly refer to any district personnel including public figures such as the Superintendent of Schools. Attempts to criticize school administrators are gaveled down and security is called.
The full version of the school district's "Code of Conduct" contains several pages about the due process rights of parents and students in cases of suspensions and expulsions - things like the right to be notified BEFORE a suspension is given, the right to be notified in "dominant language of household", the right to a hearing, the right to call witnesses, the right to an appeal. The district routinely suspends students without due process. Few parents know this because the heavily expurgated "Summary" version of the Code of Conduct sent to parents once a year has all of the pages on due process removed (sound familiar?)
The list goes on and on.
@ Robert Cox - thank you for commenting.
@ MikeFinch - "There is plenty of reading material that does not need to be censored and serves the exact same purpose." - The "need" for something to be censored is based on subjective criteria. We're not necessarily talking about material that is "unnecessarily sexual or violent", and in many cases books have been removed from curriculums and school libraries for far less.
Protecting high school students from sexual content is sort of like trying to keep the ocean floor dry.
No that "protection" is a remotely appropriate word. All they really want to do is extend the period of time in which they can maintain the illusion that their kids are innocent, pure little angels.
All they really want to do is extend the period of time in which they can maintain the illusion that their kids are innocent, pure little angels.
I just don't understand how so many parents seem to have complete retrograde amnesia. Don't they remember how they were themselves and what they knew/thought/explored as kids?
Can't we just ban all the old books and write some new ones with a kaleidoscope? I don't care how many rhymes there are in the English language for "rod"!
I once again state that it should fall upon the parent to contact the school if they find the material inappropriate. If the school thought it inappropriate it should not be in the library. but ripping out or cutting out passages that they find questionable sends an even worse message I think.
Don
This was not a book that was chosen, found to be racy in parts, and censored as a result, it was chosen specifically so that children could be given deliberately censored material
This, along with "fingerprints for library books" is an active means of introducing our children to the police/nanny state at an early age.
#32,
Sure, give 'em some Shakespeare. Malvolio in "Twelfth Night" reading a lady's letter:
"By my life, this is my lady's hand; these be her very C's, her U's and T's and thus makes she her great P's."
Like so?
Could even get him disemvowelled on bb.
My ninth-grade English teacher handed me Out of the Closets: Voices of Gay Liberation, which contained much queer theory and explicit descriptions of gay sex. It was much, much better being in high school in the 70s.
What if it was a rape scene? Is it only a problem because the graphic sex was for 'fun'?
Especially when you are talking about high school students, the censorship here is simply control. The kinds of parents who think to control what their 16 year old reads, are the kind of parents who abuse children.
I think a lot of the desire to keep children from learning about sex, is that if they all felt comfortable talking about sex, they might be emboldened to pipe up about how daddy was sticking his hands on them and worse, and that would put a damper on daddy's fun.
So you see, it is not a good thing to allow your chattel to discuss such things openly.
"Bowdlerizing is a particularly disturbing form of censorship since it not only suppresses specific content deemed 'objectionable,' but also does violence to the work by removing material that the author thought integral," said Joan Bertin, Executive Director of the National Coalition Against Censorship. "It is a kind of literary fraud perpetrated on an unsuspecting audience."
I agree with the sentiment here but can I point out that bowdlerizing is censorship on a whole, not the specific act of tearing out pages?
I believe bowdlerizing specifically refers to the editing of a text (or movie) to remove objectionable parts. Thomas Bowdler's Shakespeare is still available.
A comment on Ms. Bertin's quote about bowdlerizing:
"removing material that the author thought integral,"
It is very high moral ground indeed to make the claim that an author thinks anything in one of their books is integral. I'll go out on a limb here and suggest that if a publisher says to an author that their book will be published only if e.g. the author changes the protagonist's name from A to B and leaves out that half-page scene about the performing seal, then the author will probably change it.
I'm glad that paper books are tamper evident. It will be obvious to any curious student that something has been removed, and they will easily be able to find an unbowdlerized version.
In fact it brings great attention to the section that Someone Doesn't Want You To Read This. Who could resist a challenge like that? Reminds me of the movie "The Last Temptation of Christ". The Catholic church made such a big deal of trying to dissuade people from seeing it, many more people ended up seeing it, just to see what all the furor was about.
What worries me is with digital technology, the tampering can be much more thorough and devious. A PDF can be repaged, renumbered, and who's to know?
Sort of like Mal*Wart, which has enough financial clout to have artists bowdlerize their own works, and I don't think there's any indication that it's an altered piece of work. (Yeah, it's their "choice" to do so, and some artists agree, and others don't and forgo some of the money they might make. If you're a big name, it's a lot easier to stand up against that. For a small band that can barely make ends meet, it's not really much of a choice.)
More info at http://www.pbs.org/itvs/storewars/stores3_2.html
The world will have to rely on the diligence of happy mutants to sound the alarm.
And remember, kids. Any book worth banning is a book worth reading!
#28... won't work, doctrine of first sale... the schools can do what they like with books they've purchased... now if they were making special copies of the movie that had bits removed so they could play it back in class without having to manually skip over the objectionable content, you may have a point, but they would probably counter with a fair use exemption
I'm thinking that someone in New Rochelle just doesn't get this whole intertubes thing.
Buddy66- Bowlder's version just rearranges the letters, like this:
"By my life, this is my lady's hand : these be her very P's her U's and her T"s, and thus makes she her great C's. It is, in contempt of question, her hand."
I take it BoingBoing is in favour of this practice considering their use of disemvoweling is pretty much the same thing.
Now how long until *this* statement is disemvoweled?
not at all; bowdlerizing is trying to edit reality. Disemvowelling is the nearest thing to reaching though the screen to twist your nose. The latter is fundamentally honest.
http://philobiblos.blogspot.com/2008/11/millionaire-accused-of-mutilating-books.html
If this would've happened in my High School, the very first thing I would've done upon leaving class with my "Bowlderized" book would be to find out what was in those censored pages. Really, I can't imagine a better incentive for encouraging young students to read on their own time -- than to tell them there's material so salacious that they aren't allowed to read it.
I'd love to hear about some young agitator in this class printing & distributing the removed content & repeatedly directing the class discussion specifically to those sections while the flustered teacher tried his/her best to stick to the lesson plan.