Toronto-area Catholic school board bans Pullman fantasy trilogy reports the CBC:
At a board meeting Tuesday evening, the trustees of the Halton District Catholic School Board voted to ban the title [The Golden Compass] as well as the remaining two books in atheist author Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy: The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass.
It’s remarkable to me that such things can still go on, especially given that, although Catholic in name, the Halton District Catholic School Board is completely funded by the public. Kind of makes you wish we had some sort of over-arching law that protected our fundamental freedoms from book banners like this. Oh, wait, we do.
About This Blog
I am Peter Rukavina and this is my blog. I am a writer, letterpress printer, and a curious person.
To learn more about me, read my /now, look at my bio, listen to audio I’ve posted, read presentations and speeches I’ve written, or get in touch (peter@rukavina.net is the quickest way).
You can subscribe to an RSS feed of posts, an RSS feed of comments, or a podcast RSS feed that just contains audio posts. You can also receive a daily digests of posts by email.
Comments
Does what’s being done (book
Does what’s being done (book destruction) matter more than who’s (Church group) doing it?
Anyone?
You also have the CIC taking
You also have the CIC taking Maclean’s to various Human Rights Commissions for publishing excerpts from Mark Steyn’s book, America Alone.
Charter? What charter?
At least the Catholic school board is only banning the book from circulating within its own schools (though I still find it an odious overreaction). The CIC is trying to ban Steyn’s views from public discourse.
I agree, but having read (and
I agree, but having read (and loved) the books, I’d also call this a legitimate case of self-defense.
Let’s make clear: Book
Let’s make clear: Book “burning” was just metaphor or hyperbole, right? We’re talking about officials prohibiting their libraries from lending out these books and just perhaps policies of confiscating and delivering to a child’s parents any of these books that school officers discover in his or her possession. Sure it’s already a bad place to be on the slippery slope, but we’re not talking about a “Bonfire of the Vanities” here.
Given the odd entry in Yellow
Given the odd entry in Yellow Pages, why hasn’t the phone book been banned by now?
On a more serious and interesting note, I recently read that Pierre Trudeau regularly sought, in writing, *permission* to read certain books which were banned by the Catholic church. The intertesting part of this is that this was while he was a law student at Harvard (miles from Catholicism) and (if my memory serves) the priest he petitioned was a fervernt supporter of certain Nazis including “Duce” Benito Mussolini. He came a long way…
Add new comment