Mind-chilling bid to systematize public schools censorship

A bill the Florida House passed last week would create a far-reaching censorship system to orient all public school books and materials to views of state leaders while drowning every school in a vast sea of hearings and red tape that could create lengthy legal challenges.

School officials in all 67 counties would have to align books to mandates of the state board of education, policing from the top down. Meanwhile, the public must be told of every single book in classrooms and libraries. Schools would have to hold a hearing for every book selected and again using an outside qualified hearing officer for complaints by anyone about any book, policing from the bottom up.

Every school would have to list for the state every book removed after complaints. Every school selection of books – even donations – would be compared with that statewide complaint list so a book banned in any community would face banning everywhere.

And, so that nothing slipped through the cracks, every person in every public school who might so much as accept a donated book would have to first be trained in what is and is not acceptable to the state. A local school board hearing would review each new book being accepted, with public comments. 

The governor and education commissioner have already made clear that critical race theory is among ideas that may not enter Florida classrooms. Abetted by this legislation, they would have free rein to ban any other thoughts and writings.

While this legislation is sold as regulation of education, it is clearly regulation of ideas. The vote was on party lines – 78 Republicans yes, 40 Democrats no. If this became law, it would leave few loopholes to admit ideas of which Big Brother in Tallahassee did not approve.

Attacks on books are myriad, though seldom so systematic. Such attacks come particularly from the less educated and most manipulative among us. Educators have spent years fending off such attacks. Now the state is about to give attackers new weaponry.

The American Library Association tracks attacks on classic literary works used in classrooms. On the Radcliffe Publishing Course list of the top 100 novels of the 20th century, 46 had faced one or multiple banning attempts, and nine were attacked in Florida. State legislation that would force schools to publish online lists of books they select and to hold a public hearing on each would make it far easier for a single critic to start the ball rolling, leading to a hearing on a complaint and possible ban.

Books in the Top 100 challenged in Florida include The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger, which was ousted or challenged in three Florida school systems. Under the legislation in process, that book would be listed for every school to consider banning.

Other Top 100 books would also have been targeted for statewide bans, including The Color Purple by Alice Walker, Beloved by Toni Morrison (challenged in Sarasota County by someone who hadn’t seen the book but had read about it on the internet, which also happened in other cases), Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, and Animal Farm by George Orwell, banned in Bay County schools, which also banned 64 other books, then had to reinstate them all.

Also challenged in Florida was George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, in which totalitarian leader Big Brother policed what people read and thought in overwhelming brainwashing. That book should be required reading while looking at how Florida’s government is trying to control what our school children should hear, see or be aware of.

Of books in the Top 100 that were published in the first third of the last century, many were not only questioned in Florida but burned in Nazi Germany as Hitler rose to power. Others were banned in Russia. Also very good at book banning were Castro’s Cuba and Communist China. 

That’s the company Florida leadership is flirting with. This bill would not only allow regular looks at removing books but require those reviews, based in part on state standards.

While the House passed this bill, the Senate has not. A Senate vote would allow the governor to sign this and further tighten control over what can be read or said in Florida schools. This should frighten thoughtful Floridians. 

If you don’t worry about Gov. Ron DeSantis, worry about what a future governor might do with these powers to control young brains. Remember, any book can be challenged; the Bible has been.  

If you don’t worry about attacks on generally accepted literature, what about attacks on historical materials or social studies? 

Centralized censorship of education can lead to graduating automatons rather than thinking United States citizens who can carry our nation forward. Make sure your state senator is aware of your thoughts before the next vote to clamp down on students’ brains.