Interactive fascism

View Book Bans and Challenges, 2007-2009 in a larger map

via the American Library Association comes this Google Map of all the recorded 513 book ban challenges for last year. I know what you're saying "Only 513? We must be getting more tolerant." Nope. The ALA thinks that only about 20-25% of bans get reported.

Most surprising about the list? No Utah. There's always next year, though. As the 2009 list is not yet out, these are all for last year. But according to the ALA's top 10 Richardson and Parnell's And Tango Makes Three was last years most banned book. It's a book about gay penguins. Pulling into second is Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, which is about God as we know Him being a lie and polar bears kicking the shit out of each other. Lest you think that expressing tolerance, dislike of religion, and combining them with arctic animals is the only thing that will get you on the list, rest assured, humanizing Arabs gets you a black mark.

Looking back at previous top 10's I see that Catcher in the Rye, Huck Finn, and Of Mice and Men are still making waves. Really? Some school districts are still hashing it out whether or not these are literary classics? I just hope that when the ALA drops their 2009 list, hopefully during Banned Book Week (plan your book burning parties accordingly) next month, we can finally start getting some consistent new blood in there. If we don't change things up, people are just going to tune out yet another Huck Finn banning. Twain's had his day, let's start making a concerted effort to revile Phillip Pullman and Cormac McCarthy. For the sake of the children.