Censorship champions cloak attacks on liberty in the name of parental rights | Opinion
In 399 B.C.E., the people of Athens accused a short, bald, seventy-one-year-old Greek named Socrates of being an evil-doer who had corrupted young minds, teaching them to worship false gods and making the weaker argument defeat the worse.” Plato, Socrates’ student, recounted the trial in his Apology. Ultimately, Socrates failed in his defense, and the jury sentenced him to death.
Socrates trial occurred in a moment of crisis. Athens had fought and lost a twenty-seven-year-long war with Sparta. At the war’s conclusion, autocrats (The Thirty Tyrants) seized control of the government, exiling anyone who opposed their regime. Opposition to the oligarchy’s repressive rule led to their overthrow. The accusations against Socrates grew partly because he had remained in Athens during the oligarchy.
America, like Athens, is passing through a bitterly contentious time. For Socrates, the champions of political correctness and MAGA (Make Athens Great Again) silenced his probing questions with hemlock. Today, the champions of censorship prefer bans on Judy Blume, blocking the College Board’s AP U.S. History course, and pilloring the LBGTQ+ communities. What the MAGA true-believers forget is that the expression of opinion, either in speech or writing, is a free people’s lifeblood.
Since 1982, American librarians have designated October 1-7 as Banned Books Week. The American Library Association (ALA) reports that there has been an “alarming increase in book bans and challenges across the country.” Socrates accusers now call themselves “Moms for Liberty,” cloaking their attack on liberty of thought behind claims of protecting parental rights.
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They forget that liberty of thought means recognizing the right of others to question cherished assumptions.
Living in a democracy is challenging. Listening to ideas we hate is difficult. Stomaching provocative books and, yes, tasteless books is unpleasant. In a free, democratic society, however, all of us bear the responsibility of conceding we could be wrong in our most cherished convictions. John Milton wrote in his Areopagitca 400 years ago, “give me liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.”
Governor DeSantis, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and the Moms for Liberty need to remember this.
Celebrate Banned Books Week. Acknowlege you are not infallible. Be like Socrates, read something that makes you uncomfortable. Listen to someone who thinks differently than you do. It might just make you a better person. A final suggestion: Avoid MAGA hemlock and Woke Kool-Aid.
Gordon Patterson is a Melbourne resident. A historian and past member of the board of directors of the Florida Historical Society and Florida Humanities Council, he has taught at Florida Tech since 1981.
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Food for thought during banned book week.
