For how demonized some albums are, when you cut it down to just the "bad" parts, it really puts things in perspective. 19 seconds. 42 seconds. 29 seconds. 0 seconds. 10 seconds.
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Friday, February 26
FTRW 2010 - Friday Fun Link - "Straight Outta Compton" Edited to *Only* The Profanity
by
Jason
on Fri 26 Feb 2010 11:22 PM CST
Thursday, February 25
FTRW 2010 - Running Back To Saskatoon
by
Jason
on Thu 25 Feb 2010 10:21 PM CST
I thought somebody (the CLA Committee on Intellectual Freedom?) released an annual report on book challenges during the past year. I wasn't able to find it but the official site for Freedom to Read does have a list highlighting 100 different books that have been challenged in the past decade.
One entry in particular caught my attention: Pritchard, Jimmy. The New York City Bartender’s Joke Book. 2004—A library patron complained to the Saskatoon Public Library about this book- length collection of jokes that the author had heard while working in bars. Cause of objection—The complainant said that the jokes were in poor taste and promoted negative attitudes toward women and ethnic minorities. Update—The library’s Challenged Materials Committee later agreed that the book was “racist, sexist, and demeaning to women and citizens of many countries.” The book also failed to meet the library’s collection development standards. The committee withdrew the book from circulation. Although this is from six years ago, seeing that a library in my home province would remove a book from their collection really bugs me. Why? Well, here's a dirty little secret - the book loving, BA - English librarian you see before you didn't always read Hemingway and Faulkner (who am I kidding? I still don't - just for a few years there as an undergrad so I'd look smart in coffee shops!) Like many teenaged boys, there was a time in my young life when a lot of my pleasure reading consisted of things that weren't very literary in nature - the latest Calvin & Hobbes cartoon collection. Rock star biographies. And yes, occasionally, I would take out a book that would be the 1985 equivalent of "The New York Bartender's Joke Book". But you know what? That's part of the reason I would go to the library even at a time when it wasn't "cool". I don't remember saying this exactly but if a friend called me a nerd for going to the library, I could show them the joke book. "Really? You got that? At the library? Lemme see that!" After all, isn't this one of the single biggest hand-wringers in public libraries today? "How do we get teenaged boys to come to the library?" Offensive joke books aren't the full answer. But they're part of it if you're truly committed to serving *all* of your users - which most public libraries claim to be. Even though I read such a "harmful" book in my formative years, I'm glad no one at Regina Public Library or Indian Head Public Library had to decide whether this book was appropriate for me or not and that decision was mine to make alone. I like to think that I don't have negative attitudes towards women or minorities because I read books like this, just like I don't want to start a war because I read "Rambo: First Blood". (I will cop to having bad taste on occasion - that's nothing to do with my reading choices though!) The other reason this bugs me is that it hits a lot closer to home than it did, even a few years ago. Under the new province-wide SILS consortium, every library system has worked very hard to come up with a common set of policies. Each system still retains the right to develop its own internal policies in regards to things like collection development, intellectual freedom and so on so the common policies are mostly in regards to how items circulate, fine tables, patron registration and things like that. So if it doesn't directly affect me at RPL or in my day-to-day work, why get so worked up? Well, for one thing, there's always a danger that this could be the start of the proverbial slippery slope. The next time a book gets challenged in Saskatoon, it'll be harder for someone there to say "no". And it might be harder in Regina too - especially if we're partners in SILS. "My sister, Alice Tinhat Jones, got a joke book with the 'n' word in it removed from Saskatoon Public Library. I'd like this one removed as well." Uhm, madame, that's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. "I don't care. You're partners with SPL aren't you?") To be frank, I also don't like that this decision has both tinges of both imposed morality AND political correctness - both extremes of the censorship spectrum. As I point out in one of my all-time favourite posts, "What Freedom To Read Is *Not*": 6. Freedom to Read is not a "left" or a "right" issue (I think people often believe that only people holding the opposite opinion of their own want to ban books.) Challenges come from both ends of the political spectrum and are just as likely to come on grounds of political correctness from someone on the left as on they are on morality grounds from someone on the right. Wednesday, February 24
FTRW 2010 - ChatRoulette
by
Jason
on Wed 24 Feb 2010 08:38 PM CST
It's not book related but nothing says Freedom of Expression like the newest buzz site of the Internet, ChatRoulette. The site is exactly what it says - you hit the site and you see a chat window for yourself and one for a random person somewhere in the world. As soon as you get bored (which is usually fairly quickly - basically as soon as you see the other person's face...or they see yours), you click a button and see someone else. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
(I did it just now and got hung up on about five times in a row, had a brief chat with two guys who were watching the Canada-Russia game and saw one set of fingers making hand puppets. Contrary to my previous experience with web cams way back in the late 1990's - and frankly what I was expecting here - every second person wasn't trying to show me their penis which was nice. Perhaps if I was female?) So it's not all people freely exposing expressing themselves as you might expect - there's humour, love and even puppets! Oh, and you might see the occasional vagina as well. (via MetaFilter) [2010-03-05: The Daily Show adds their hilarious take on ChatRoulette.] [2010-03-15 - Piano Improv ChatRoulette is pretty funny.] Tuesday, February 23
FTRW 2010 - Hitler and the Public Domain
by
Jason
on Tue 23 Feb 2010 10:13 PM CST
German copyright law grants an author copyright for 70 years after their death. Hitler died in 1945 so that means "Mein Kampf" will enter the public domain in that country in 2015. Or will it?
There is a well-known German law banning the dissemination of Nazi ideologies which was put in place after the fall of the Third Reich. Germans (including many Jewish groups) claim that this law trumps any right the infamous work has to freely enter the public domain. Opponents counter that the diaries of Goebbels and Himmler are easily available in Germany already (as is Mein Kampf for anyone with an Internet connection). German scholars want the work to enter the public domain so they can prepare an annotated version of "Mein Kampf" for 2015 while the government fears that Neo-Nazi groups would prepare their own propagandized version. Libraries get a mention in the linked article as well. "Stephan J. Kramer, secretary general of the Central Council of Jews in Germany in Berlin, said the publication of “Mein Kampf” continued to split the Jewish community in Germany, with many Holocaust survivors opposing its publication. “I have the highest respect for this opinion, but on the other hand I’m saying very openly: The copyright is going to be waived anyway. It’s a matter of time before the book is available in shops and libraries,” Mr. Kramer said." I've already discussed my own early exposure to Mein Kampf on this blog and I'm pretty sure it's clear what side of the debate I'm on - it is Freedom to Read Week after all! (I should do a post and try to list which books I think *should* be banned, if any. That'd be a fun challenge.) Monday, February 22
FTRW 2010 - Music Monday "Listen, little girl, it's near the hour...I've got the righteous power"
by
Jason
on Mon 22 Feb 2010 08:33 PM CST
So yeah...
I was trying to think of a good clip to feature for Music Monday now that it's Freedom to Read Week. I thought about posting Elvis' infamous early Milton Berle appearance which led to him only being filmed from the waist up when he later appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show. But that's pretty tame by today's standards - sort of like how people still want to challenge "Catcher in the Rye" because the words "heck" and "gosh-darn" are in there.  Then I remembered a song I heard when I first moved into college dorms - pretty much fresh off the farm at 17 - when the most rebellious music I knew was Def Leppard. I actually didn't even hear the song from the shock rock outfit, the Mentors (and until about five minutes ago, had never heard it.) Instead, a a floormate quoted some of the lyrics to me and they have been seared into my brain ever since.  Still, that famous line about "I may not agree with what you say but I'll defend to the death, your right to say it" applies here. It has to because if it doesn't, freedom of expression is absolutely meaningless. I'm actually nervous about hitting the "Submit" button this post because this is some pretty disturbing stuff and people always confuse the defense of something with an endorsement. But ultimately, that's what Freedom of Expression is about. I am not going to run out and buy a Mentors CD (probably - unless I need to shock some other sheltered small town kid!) but some people do and did. Some people went to their shows. As long as there's nothing illegal happening, that's completely within their rights - the band's rights, the fans' rights and according to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, that's within anyone's rights (as is your right *not* to click through to any lyrics or music I link to in this post. And trust me, the lines I quoted in the title of this post are pretty much the only two lines in the song that I felt comfortable doing so!) I'll save you the pain and link to a clip of the live version of the song where the lyrics are hard to understand (here's a link to the album version of the song for the braver souls among you - I won't censor but I will warn you that you can't un-hear this song once you hear it!) [Edit: I forgot to bring it back to Elvis the Pelvis like I originally wanted to. One of the strongest anti-censorship arguments that I know is to compare the comments made by people who were disgusted by Elvis with those who were/are disgusted with Eldon Hoke below - "filthy", "depraved", "sick", "demonic", etc. Notice something? They're the exact same words! To me, that shows that the people who hated Elvis in the 1950's are the exact same type of people who hated Eldon Hoke in the 1990's - even though those same anti-Hoke people in the 1990's probably liked Elvis, took family vacations to Graceland and will shell out for the new Cirque du Soleil Elvis show the next time they're in Vegas. So to me, it's *really* important to keep in mind that it's all very relative. Something that offends me today (and Eldon Hoke definitely comes really close!) will probably be a Broadway show that Pace goes to see with his family in thirty years.] Sunday, February 21
FTRW 2010 - Ban This Book!!!
by
Jason
on Sun 21 Feb 2010 07:54 PM CST
It's extremely rare that you'll hear me advocating for a book to be challenged. But as my former classmate (and published author) Corey Redekop asks in his post on this year's Freedom to Read Week celebrations: "could you challenge me? Call a
library and demand that I be taken off the shelves? Nothing sells a
person on a book like a little controversy."
So if you want to help out a fellow librarian, go to your local library this week and put in a challenge against "Shelf Monkey". It could actually be fun - like a banned book flash mob - and since Corey's book has censorship as one of its central themes - it'd be a perfect fit. Hmmm, I started this post with my tongue firmly in cheek but I'm talking myself into this...I think it'd make a really good statement about censorship if a book that is firmly against censorship had a bunch of challenges during Freedom to Read Week, especially if they all used the same reason. Something like "This book is wrong with its theme that censorship is wrong." It's a bit of a conflict of interest (or at least potentially awkward) for us public librarians to do this at our home libraries. So hopefully you academic librarians out there pick up the torch (or we in public libraries could put in a challenge of Corey's book at a neighbouring town - that would work too!) Saturday, February 20
FTRW 2010 - Saturday Snap - Freedom to Read Week Begins Tomorrow!
by
Jason
on Sat 20 Feb 2010 12:36 AM CST
Freedom to Read Week beings tomorrow. Flickr has lots of photos (including displays from libraries around the world) to get you in the mood! Plus you might even happen across a library colleague who bears a striking resemblance to a young Malcolm MacDowell in his FTRW shoot!
 Tuesday, February 16
FTRW 2010 - We Read Banned Books (and Other Stuff Too)
by
Jason
on Tue 16 Feb 2010 07:16 PM CST
The BC Library Association's Intellectual Freedom Committee has an unofficial blog with lots of good reading.
(I was going to title this post "The only BC-related post you'll read on a blog this week that doesn't mention the Olympics." But then I realised that this would be like the Hawthorne Effect of blogs. )Monday, February 8
Saturday, February 6
FTRW 2010 - Friday Fun Link - List of Films That Most Frequently Use The Word "Fuck"
by
Jason
on Sat 06 Feb 2010 08:24 AM CST
Looking for a good date movie? I'm just kidding but this list of "Films That Most Frequently Use The Word 'Fuck'" does remind me of a funny anecdote from my youth.
A friend had introduced me to "Reservoir Dogs" soon after it came out on video and I quickly became a Tarantino junkie. When I found out that "True Romance", a movie he'd written but not directed was coming out, I was pretty pumped to go see it. The release of this movie happened to coincide with me being introduced to a rather nice young woman by mutual friends. As these things go, I asked her to a movie but somewhat selfishly, decided that I really wanted to see "True Romance" so I suggested that this be the movie we go see. She hadn't heard of the film or Tarantino or "Reservoir Dogs" so agreed. I mean, to her the title had "Romance" in it and it started Christian Slater who'd been in "The Legend of Billie Jean" and "Young Guns II" - how bad could it be? I picked her up and while waiting for her to get ready, checked out her movie collection. She had a VHS copy of every Disney movie ever released and really, not much else. "Oh-oh" I remember thinking. But I was *really* excited to see the Tarantino film and the thought of doing a quick switch to a different film didn't even cross my mind. Well, you can imagine how things went. The film about a young couple (one a comic store loser, one a hooker who his boss hires for him as a birthday present) who accidentally end up in possession of a suitcase full of cocaine. It contains all the elements of the best (you may choose to put that word in quotes, depending on your personal taste - I know she would've) elements of a Tarantino movie - violence, dark humour, pop culture references, a wicked soundtrack. One scene where a mobster ends up beating the hooker (who'd been left in the room while her boyfriend goes to get ice cream!  ) was so disturbing that I was cringing in my seat (and not just because I was on a first date with a Disney chick sitting beside me!)The movie ended, I took her home and we parted ways. Believe it or not, I think we may have seen each other a few more times after that although honestly, I think the magic was gone about two minutes into the movie where it became clear that this movie wasn't anywhere near "The Lady and The Tramp" but would be a really intense version of "The Loser and The Tramp". TL;DR: For a first date, I took a huge Disney Fangirl to a Movie That Ranks Near The Top of "Films That Most Frequently Use The Word 'Fuck'" right up there with "Eddie Murphy: Raw" and "The Departed".  Oh, and the movie also features perhaps the greatest scene of dialogue in the history of film between Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper... |
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