“What Free Thing Is So Good You Can’t Believe It’s Actually Available For Free? (30 Answers)

How about the ones with graphic drawings of b**wjobs & a**l sex? Good to go in the children's section? They aren't even allowed to be shown at adults school board meetings........

@GPawesomeness: you seem to be confusing pornography with children's educational material. Either that, or your imagination has run away with you - far, far away, well over the horizon...

It may be that dual editions are being released....but what's the result of that going to be? Schools and libraries will be pressured into stocking only the "inclusive" editions. Parent groups will pressure publishers, distributors and advertisers to only sell and market those editions to children. Sales of the actual, original book will decrease until it no longer "makes sense" to offer a choice. Both sides of the political aisle are attempting to censor free expression, the left is also actively trying to compel people into parroting words and idea's that they find acceptable. This kind of "movement" has happened before, some of us know where it leads, and none of it should be tolerated.

iseefractals, you mentioning that the left is trying to compel people into parroting words and ideas. It seems to me that you are doing quite a bit of parroting yourself.

Of course parents don't want their children exposed to the vicious racist nastiness of yesteryear. Editing the racist nastiness out of old-fashioned books for kids keeps them in print - they just wouldn't sell otherwise. What happened to the idea of the freedom to choose how to bring up your children? Are we to be forced to bring up our children to be racist bigots just because of the values of years gone by?

Some of the language in Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" has been softened in some editions because of the mistaken impression that it is a children's book. Doing so blunts one of the major points of the novel.

Except...they are "similar" both acts serve to censor idea's, language and art so as to placate an insignificant number of people who are so fragile, narcissistic and entitled that they believe the rest of the world is required to exist according to their terms. It's the same exact playbook that communist regimes used to control and divide the populace. It's absolutely horrifying how many people either fail to understand this, or simply choose to ignore it because they happen to agree/not care in this particular instance. It's like death by 1000 paper cuts, and your fingers are bleeding.

I am not a fan of softening everything in life for a child, so I *kinda* agree with that point you made. I don't agree, though, that a warning about (for example) racist language being used in a book and putting that in context is the same as editing it or banning the book outright. The weird pseudo-Christians who run around demanding libraries put books away that are too sexual for children go a bit further, even. The choices of what the "allow" and what not are so deliberate that essentially, they cut parts of a child's understanding of the world out! By declaring books about sexual identity "sexual" and putting them in the adult section (at best) makes it even harder for a kid in puberty to figure themself out - especially in smaller towns where there aren't many places to talk about that openly,. Sometimes, even books about how a child is made falls under the censorship, so hello teen-pregnancies and STI. Kids will not be celibate just because Mom wants them to! Ain't gonna happen

um, iseefractals, there is no comparison to folks wanting to make minor changes to books for them to fit with today's societal norms. But editing a book is NOT the same as banning a book. Even edited books still have the original available. There is no comparison between minor tweaks and BANNING BOOKS!!!!

hmm....that kind of seems like the same brand of thinking that republicans are engaging in as they try to revise text books to down play slavery and the civil war. Pretty much nothing from that era fits with the "societal norms" of today, right? Downright distasteful! No one wants to know about any of that, best to tone it down. Who cares if it's true to history, facts, or even someone's artistic vision? When other people try to change, censor, or ban your words so as to fit their own idea's of what is or is not acceptable...they're all in the same exact boat. Consider how much text you've put onto the internet. How would you like having someone come in and "tweak" the things you've written? Free speech is at the top of the list for a reason....that you don't understand something, or it's value doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Allowing ignorance to drive the expression of idea's is as stupid as it is dangerous.

The point about removing divisive racist nastiness and so on from old children's books is to keep them in print. If you left the vicious gollywogs in Enid Blyton, parents wouldn't buy the books for their children so sales would drop so far the publishers wouldn't print them. Thus, removing aspects of old children's books that are obviously nasty is exactly the opposite of censorship or divisive communist thought-control.

Actually, it's authoritarians who are banning books. Those opposing book bans are those in favour of liberty, many of whom are right wing.