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

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/16364130

Appeals court tells Texas it cannot ban books for mentioning ‘butt and fart’

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”.

  • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
    58·
    5 months ago

    Yeah. They (pretend to) consider the kind of things that children (and many adults) find more hilarious than anything else “pornographic filth” and racial and ethnic slurs protected speech.

    These people are literally mentally unwell authoritarian bigots.

    • paddirn@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      5 months ago

      Almost the entirety of what my kids find funny is just adding ‘poopy’, ‘pee’, butt’, and ‘fart’ to sentences. If there is a god, I’m pretty sure they could’ve found less funny ways for us to expel gases and bodily waste than the current system (though we’d still joke about it).