Wormwood

Reflections on an Endangered Nation

I published this essay almost three years’ ago. Talk of censorship certainly infected the first Trump administration and was festering among the Boards of Education and the State Houses of Trump country, but it hadn’t yet become the rabid obsession and key agenda item of the executive branch and right-wing corporate media.

Staring at the Eclipse

According to a recent issue of the Los Angeles Times, American classics like Catcher in the Rye, Brave New World, Grapes of Wrath, To Kill a Mockingbird, Beloved, Catch-22, and Animal Farm were listed among “the most banned books” in America’s schools this year (May 15, 2023).

This dangerous trend should alarm Americans who understand that democracy is about more than flag waving, chest thumping, gun rights, and red MAGA hats. History reminds us that banning books is a favorite opening gambit in the move towards dictatorship. In Areopagitica, Milton rang the bell:

“Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul whose progeny they were . . .good almost as kill a man as kill a good book: who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God’s image; he who kills a good book kills reason itself, kills the image of God in the eye. Many a man lives a burden to the earth; but a good book is the precious lifeblood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond.”

Censoring books is not only a dangerous endeavor, it is also foolish and self-defeating. First of all, censorship draws attention to the chosen books, making them more popular, even more alluring, to curious readers, especially youths intrigued by what irritates their elders. In Areopagitica, Milton himself states that instead of suppressing the popularity of the banned books, censorship “raises them and invests them with a reputation,” and may even “prove a nursing mother to [them].”

Second, once these books have been tagged and pulled from the shelves, how will the appointed school board censors prevent curious students from downloading the named books onto their pads and computers? While China and Russia may have been successful in shutting down those features of the internet, MAGA politicians are not quite there yet.

Third, as Milton warned, once censorship begins, where will it stop? “Ye must repeal and proscribe all scandalous and unlicensed books already printed and divulged.” They have already attacked the above-mentioned classics Will MAGA censors now revive past objections to Ulysses, Lady Chatterly’s Lover, The Satanic Verses, and Lolita? Are they setting the stage for a 21st century book burning?

Fourth, how do we determine who is qualified to be a censor? What is that person’s education and experience? that person’s tastes and values? And what qualifies him or her to speak for an entire community? Here in Moore County, NC, the school board has two self-appointed censors -- Philip Holmes, a local undertaker and David Hensley, an arms dealer. Both men are passionate supporters of the frequently indicted ex-president and are determined to clear the school’s bookshelves of books they dislike.  Yet nothing in their background, experience, or temperament suggests these men should be selecting or deselecting books for anyone other than themselves. For Milton, “he who is made judge to sit upon the birth or death of books. . . had need to be a man above the common measure, studious, learned, and judicious.” These guys?

Milton also linked censorship with history’s most tyrannical and repressive regimes (like the Spanish Inquisition).  Americans who believe in a constitutional republic should be alarmed by the company we would be joining. Trump’s recent manifesto of “retribution” if re-elected, or violent insurrection if he is not, suggests he is preparing to institute an authoritarian state or start a civil war. Being allied with Putin, Xi, Orban, and MBS would certainly please and flatter him.

“Authoritarianism” is not being used here in a pejorative sense. In politics and government, it means something very specific:

·      Blind submission to authority.

·      Repression of individual freedom of thought and action. 

·      Suspension of means for peaceful transfers of executive power.

·      Suspension of civil liberties or political rights.

·      Concentration of power in the hands of a single charismatic leader or a small elite whose decisions are taken without regard for the will of the people.

·      A powerful secret police apparatus and a weak, compliant court system, both answerable only to the leader. (Encyclopedia Britannica)

But censorship is not an only child. It always works in tandem with its twin brother -- propaganda. One brother removes what cannot be read; the other inserts what can be read. Censorship and propaganda lay the foundation for the blinding regimentation that ensues. Rote learning and memorization from a white-washed MAGA curriculum will supplant critical thinking in an effort to vaccinate the population against unseemly curiosity, especially on matters of race, gender, climate, and gun violence.

MAGA Republican legislatures (cf. Texas et al) are already eliminating higher order thinking skills, that is, critical thinking, from their curricula. In its place MAGA politicians plan to insert books, lessons, and vetted teachers — all overseen by Christian Nationalists who swear allegiance to the man Liz Cheney called “Orange Jesus” and his red-state apostles.

Critical thinking terrifies the MAGAverse because it values facts and the ability to analyze information objectively in order to make reasoned judgments. Authoritarians distrust critical thinkers because they wonder and ponder rather than blindly take orders. They ask questions, make independent judgments, and think outside the tyrant’s box. That makes them untrustworthy, even dangerous.

And while MAGA folks celebrate their freedoms, their desire to “keep government off their backs,” condemning what they call the “nanny state,” they willingly surrender to the “Orange Jesus,” vowing to follow him into his mythical “Golden Palace” -- that place where murderous tyrants are smart and strong, where cheating is fair play, where an insurrection is a rally, where a loss is a victory, where a theft is rightful ownership, where a Big Mac is cuisine, where rape is locker room stuff, where bullshit is truth.

Americans need to stop staring at the eclipse and heed Milton’s words:

“Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties” (Areopagitica).