Conservative-dominated court restores books denounced by officials as ‘pornographic filth’ to school libraries

An appellate court has ruled that Texas cannot ban books from libraries simply because they mention “butt and fart” and other content which some state officials may dislike.

The fifth US circuit court of appeals issued its decision on Thursday in a 76-page majority opinion, which was written by Judge Jacques Wiener Jr and opened with a quote from American poet Walt Whitman: “The dirtiest book in all the world is the expurgated book.”

In its decision, the appellate court declared that “government actors may not remove books from a public library with the intent to deprive patrons of access to ideas with which they disagree”.

  • dohpaz42@lemmy.world
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    28 days ago

    And these old farts are complaining about how “soft” today’s youth are? They really need to get their heads out of their butts.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      28 days ago

      To be fair, he didn’t have to make it that long.

      On the other hand, we wouldn’t have gotten this:

      • Seven “butt and fart” books, with titles like I Broke My Butt! and Larry the Farting Leprechaun;

    • subignition@fedia.io
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      28 days ago

      for extra effect, I recommend reading through the opinion first before imagining. The high quality of the writing really accentuates the ludicrous degree of clown shit on display from the GOP.

    • vortic@lemmy.world
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      28 days ago

      The primary opinion is only 27 pages. The rest is a three page concurrence a 46 page dissent by Duncan.

  • vortic@lemmy.world
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    28 days ago

    I think it says something that one of the books they were trying to ban was Called Themselves the K.K.K: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group by Susan Campbell Bartoletti.

    • Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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      28 days ago

      If you look at the books that were banned and take out all the humorous ones about butts and farts, you’re left almost exclusively with books about past conservative atrocities and books about current targets of conservative bigotry.

      The people who want to ban these books were too bigoted for the 5th Circuit. They’ll probably try to close the whole library next.

  • sp3tr4l@lemmy.zip
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    28 days ago

    The Bible describes God showing Moses his ‘backside’, which a number of actual scholars interpret as including his butt.

    Not sure about farts in the Bible, but there’s stories about rape, incest, at one point a description of men with ‘emission like donkeys’, ie, huge cum loads from big dicks.

    They seem to never learn that if you try to ban ‘pornographic’ text, you’ll have to ban the Bible as well.

    • theangryseal@lemmy.world
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      28 days ago

      Nuh uh. I swored on the bi-bull three times. That ain’t in there. I never heard my preacher say that and all he ever talked about was the bi-bull.

      • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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        28 days ago

        Kids fucking live for fart and butt jokes. I’ve never seen a group of children giggle harder than when I watched a teacher read “I Need a New Butt.”

        • theangryseal@lemmy.world
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          28 days ago

          My older kids went through a phase where they were just randomly saying “butt” for like a year. By the end of it I couldn’t stand my own ass.

          “Hey dad, dad, DAD!”

          “What is it kiddo?”

          “Butts! Ahahahahaha. Just picture it, crack down the middle, poopin’, just hanging out being a butt.”

          When I realized I hadn’t heard the word “butt” for a few months, my sigh of relief could have changed the orbit of the planet.

  • Silverseren@fedia.io
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    28 days ago

    Apparently terms that anyone over 12 years old doesn’t find funny anymore count as “adult”.

    Is this conservatives admitting that they are all just immature children?

  • Norgur@fedia.io
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    28 days ago

    Anyone else thinking that this Judge would have gotten his autobiography banned for profanity just for the name?

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    28 days ago

    Every child between the ages of 2 and 10 would find a book with nothing but the words ‘butt’ and ‘fart’ endlessly amusing.

  • PoopDelivery@sh.itjust.works
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    28 days ago

    Good. Fuck Butt Fart Texas. Books should not be censored for words. I remember a teacher in maybe 7th grade reading a book outloud with the word fuck in it, and he just said it and kept reading, he.knew the book well. I gained a lot of respect for that teacher and listened to him because I felt like he wasn’t going to censor what he taught us.

    • JonEFive@midwest.social
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      28 days ago

      Good teacher. Authors choose their words intentionally. I’m guessing “fudging”, “friggen”, and “ducking” (thanks iPhone) are not great replacements for the subject matter.

  • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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    28 days ago

    Btw, I absolutely ADORE that the acronym for the system used by libraries to weed out old books is MUSTIE 😆❤️

      • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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        28 days ago

        Llano County applies the “MUSTIE” factors in weeding books, as recommended by experts in the field, under which a book is evaluated for whether it is (1) “Misleading and/or factually inaccurate,” (2) “Ugly (worn out beyond mending or rebinding),” (3) “Superseded by a new edition or a better source,” (4) “Trivial (of no discernable literary or scientific merit),” (5) “Irrelevant to the needs and interests of the community,” or (6) “Elsewhere (the material may be easily borrowed from another source).” W