The Perpetual Battle Against Censorship Essay -- The Fight Against Cen

There is more than one way to burn a book, (176) says Ray Bradbury when explaining the reason he wrote Fahrenheit 451. Bradbury at the time was upset almost condensed books, or books which had been simplified for easier reading. Luckily, this fad seems to have passed. However, he was also upset about people who wrote asking him to change the role of women or African-Americans to make them more or less dominant in some of his works. One of the major themes in Fahrenheit 451 was just that a society where everyone got what they wished and literature was eliminated entirely so it wouldnt offend anyone. Sadly, this still continues to happen in the United States. Many books have been banned from school and public libraries because of language, sexual innuendos, violence, religion, alternate lifestyles, and even for being anti-family (Challenges . . .). Although the suntan of books simply for the sake of eradicating them is a futile effort today, as Bradbury stated, censoring or banning them is basically the same thing. However, should literature be banned for pique a few? Many people dont think so, and they have U.S. rectitudes to back them up. Not only is the censorship of literature in violation of the U.S. Constitutions first amendment, just it also deprives the American people of culture and knowledge. The main argument against censorship is, of course, the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States. The first amendment reads Congress shall make no law respecting on establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to bespeak the government for a redress of gr... ...e American Library Association. n.d. 13 Mar. 2014. http//www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/top100Parkinson, Sid. Miltons Areopagitica. Discourse 14 (Fall 1995). 12 Mar. 2014. http//www.stlawrenceinstitute.org/vol14mit.html Remy, Richard C. United States Government Democracy in Action. New York The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2012. Stanton McCandlish on the CDA (fwd). 14 Feb. 1996. 21 Feb. 2014. http//lawlibrary.ucdavis.edu/LAWLIB/feb96/0400.htmlWeisberger, Bernard A. Chasing Smut in Every Medium. American Heritage Dec. 1997. 12 Feb. 2014. http//www.dc.peachnet.edu/yliu/papr/comstock.htm). Woolsey, John M. The Monumental Decision of the United States District Court Rendered celestial latitude 6, 1933, by Hon. John M. Woolsey Lifting the Ban on Ulysses. Ulysses. New York Random House, 6 Dec. 1943. pp ix-xiv.