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The Association of American Publishers and associates are in court, they say, to protect freedoms foundational to our democracy.

Image Getty iStockphoto: Chuang Tzu Dreaming

By Porter Anderson, Editor-in-Chief | @Porter_Anderson

Today (June 2), the Association of American Publishers (AAP) has become one entity in a coalition of publishers, booksellers, librarians and readers filing a lawsuit to defend Arkansas citizens right to read.

And also today, the AAP has made common cause with some of the worlds largest publishing companies to file an amicus brief in a case in Llano County, Texas.

These responses reflect what AAP president and CEO Maria A. Pallante told the main-stage audience at London Book Fair in April: some of the most severe assaults on freedom of expression and the freedom to publish in the American market appear to be starting in the provinces, as it might be said in Europe. Actions often hostile to the publics right to read what it chooses are surfacing first in state, municipal, and/or county jurisdictions far from the nations Washington-based federal center.

Signed by Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the governor of Arkansas and a former press secretary for the Donald Trump White House, Act 372 was signed on March 30 and is scheduled to go into effect on August 1.

As described for an April 19 report by Jacqueline Froelich for KUAF, a National Public Radio affiliate, Arkansas Act 372 which takes effect in a few months criminalizes librarians and library staff for knowingly furnishing print and digital literature to minors ruled to be harmful or obscene. The measure was brought by Right-wing Republican lawmakers who seek to erase juvenile library materials about racial equity and inclusion, queer culture, black history, and sex education.

In the Arkansas case, the newly filed lawsuit challenges a bill that the plaintiffs say would restrict access to books in state bookstores and public libraries. The coalition speaking collectively to the news media in this case includes:

In their media messaging, the group says:

Mary Rasenberger

In a separate statement provided to Publishing Perspectives, Mary Rasenberger, CEO of the Authors Guild, says, The argument that certain books need to be removed from schools to protect children is now being used to limit access for adults, as well, which infringes on everyones rights. Efforts to remove these books not only diminish the richness of our cultural tapestry but also send a message that the experiences of LGBTQ+ and other marginalized communities are unworthy of representation.

Its our shared responsibility to safeguard the literary freedom that forms the bedrock of a democratic society. By supporting the availability and accessibility of diverse books, we can foster dialogue, promote understanding, and counter the marginalization of these communities.

In this case today, the AAP has been joined by Penguin Random House, Candlewick Press, Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Scholastic, and Simon & Schuster in filing an amicus brief in support of the plaintiffs, patrons of the Llano County Library System in Llano County, Texas, in the case of Little v. Llano County.

At The New York Times in April, David Montgomery and Alexandra Alter, writing about the controversy, said, Several of the books in question in Llano County have LGBTQ themes or characters, or addressed racial inequality, but they also include goofy childrens titles, such as a series of picture books about flatulence.

So contentious has the situation become, in which a reported 17 books were removed from the Llano County library system, that the county considered shutting down its libraries rather than restore the books to the shelves, as a court ordered. What this suit challenges are actions taken by members of the Llano County Commissioners Court; members of the Llano County Library Board; and the Llano County Library System Director.

The underlying lawsuit, Little v. Llano County, was filed on April 25, 2022, by seven Llano County residents, claiming that, among other things, public officials had violated their constitutional rights under the First Amendment by banning books based on content and viewpoint. In March 2023, a federal court granted plaintiffs a preliminary injunction, which ordered that return of the books to the library system and catalog. The defendants are now appealing that decision.

Matthew Stratton

In a separate statement from Matthew Stratton, deputy general counsel for the AAP, we read, On behalf of our many members, we are pleased to file this amicus brief in support of the critically important suit brought by public library patrons

As our brief states,the instinct to ban books is not unique to any particular political ideology, but regardless of when or where it happens, the removal of books from the shelves of a public library is fundamentally inconsistent with the tenets of American democracy.

Accordingly, time and again courts have upheld core First Amendment freedoms by rejecting attempts to impose viewpoint and content-based discrimination in libraries.

And in part of the amicus brief, its pointed out, The countys removals targeted some of the most celebrated and consequential works of recent years, as well as popular and classic childrens books.

The titles include:

More from Publishing Perspectives on issues of censorship is here, more on book bannings is here, more on the Association of American Publishers is here, and more on the Authors Guild is here.

Porter Anderson is a non-resident fellow of Trends Research & Advisory, and he has been named International Trade Press Journalist of the Year in London Book Fair's International Excellence Awards. He is Editor-in-Chief of Publishing Perspectives. He formerly was Associate Editor for The FutureBook at London's The Bookseller. Anderson was for more than a decade a senior producer and anchor with CNN.com, CNN International, and CNN USA. As an arts critic (National Critics Institute), he was with The Village Voice, the Dallas Times Herald, and the Tampa Tribune, now the Tampa Bay Times. He co-founded The Hot Sheet, a newsletter for authors, which now is owned and operated by Jane Friedman.

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Battling Literary Censorship: New Court Action in the United States - Publishing Perspectives

The trial ended in a few minutes: Four lashes would fall on the body of Khawar Naeem Hashmi, accused of defacing the mausoleum of Mohammad Ali Jinnah on Pakistans independence day in 1977. He was, arguably, lucky the other journalists who had joined him in a public protest against military dictatorship were sentenced to five lashes each. Lines were drawn on their backs to ensure the whip would fall with precision; army officers, Hashmi later recalled, would amuse their families by bringing them along to watch.

Lashings seemed to have become popular amusements in General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haqs time. A hundred thousand people gathered in a Karachi park to watch the punishment of Mohammed Kaleem, convicted of raping a child.

Earlier this week, newspaperowners and editors were called into meetings with Pakistans military brass and ordered to cease covering establishment darling-turned-insurrectionary Imran Khan. During his own term as Prime Minister, Imran and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) directorateused enforced disappearances, torture, and false criminal cases to terrorise journalists,evendriving some dissidents into exile.

Absar Alam was shot outside his house,expert Lynn ODonnell records. Asad Ali Toor was bound, gagged, and beaten inside his own home. Exiled critics even found themselves targeted for assassinationoverseas by hit squads alleged to have been hired by the ISI.

This time around, Imran has been made to wear the muzzle and chain he gleefully used on his opponentsand thats bad news for Pakistan.

Also read: Imran Khan supporters will call it a revolution. But Pakistan in ashes is the

Like much of the Indian media, the news industry of Pakistan was born in the ideological crucible of the freedom movement.Dawn, founded by Pakistan movement patriarch Mohammad Ali Jinnah, was converted from a weekly to a daily newspaper. Mir Khalil-ur-Rehmans Jang, Hamid NizamisNawa-i-Waqt,and Mian IftikharuddinsPakistan Times would drive the emergence of a new generation of post-independence media conglomerates.

Even though an organised media flowered,historians Saima Parveen and Muhammad Nawaz Bhattiremind us, it was not free to defend the democratic values; instead they were working to praise government policies. National interests, the glory of Islam, and the Ideology of Pakistanwerecatchphrases used to extend support from the press for the government.

General Ayub Khans military regime institutionalised this informal censorship. The Left-leaningPakistan Times,Imroz,andLail-o-Nahar were nationalised. The three mass-circulation newspapers run by former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhuttos family Musawat,Hilal-i-Pakistan, andNusrat also ended up in the hands of the State-owned National Press Trust.

ThePress and Publication Ordinance introduced by General Ayub and which, among other things, penalised the publication of crimes of violence or sex in a manner likely to excite unhealthy curiosity as well as information calculated to cause public alarm, frustration or despondencyprovided a powerful tool where gentler persuasion failed.

Future historians might debate just how significant censorship was as a tool of regime survival. The law, notably, could not stop Dhaka newspapers from publishing special supplements on 23 March 1971,theanniversary of the Muslim Leagues Pakistan resolution as Emancipation of Bangladesh Day.

Also read: Pakistan Army wont bounce back easily this time. Imran Khan shattering its illusion of

Following his installation as President after the 1971Bangladesh war,media expert JM Williams noted, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto started using more subtle kinds of coercion. The supply of newsprint was a State monopoly, and major advertisers like Pakistan International Airlines were also public-sector entities. The new President had promised to dissolve the National Press Trust earlier but rapidly concluded that the tyrants tool could serve its ends too.

The government moved to cancel the newsprint quotas ofJang,stopped advertising for Dawn, and bannedThe Sun.

General Zia, who seized power in 1977, tightened State control over the media. Even journalists were jailed. Four more Masudullah Khan, Iqbal Jafri, Khawar Naeem Hashmi, and Nisar Zaidi were flogged for organising apro-democracy hunger strike. As during Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhis Emergency, pre-censorship of content was introduced in Pakistan.

Even though Zias regime modelled itself on the revolutionary Islamism of Iranian mullahs and the monarchical concentration of power of Saudi Arabia, those regimes managed to use their resources to address at least some of their economic and social problems. The same cannot be said of the Islamism of Zia,Ibrahim Karawan has noted.

FormerPrime Minister Benazir Bhutto did initiate an opening-up of media freedoms in the democratic revival that followed,buteditor Imran Aslamrecorded that her government routinely sought to buy off critical journalists. The military, for its part, maintained its own list of client writers as it battled the Prime Minister for control.

The Nawaz Sharifgovernmentrestored the use of blunt tools. The owner ofThe News, Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman, famously released taped conversations of two prominent government officials seeking to blackmail him into sacking critical journalists by threatening tax prosecutions.

Former military ruler General Pervez Musharraf cast himself as a defender of the free press and enabled the rise of private television news broadcasting. Even under Musharraf, though, journalists who crossed the establishment faced severe consequences. The journalist Syed Saleem Shahzadwas murdered, allegedlyby military agents.

Also read:The soured love affair between Imran Khan and Pakistan Army is a ticking time

Lessons for India

To Indians familiar withtheir ownmedia history, much of this story will be depressingly familiar. Like in Pakistan, a powerful illiberal impulse ran through Indian democratic institutionsafter Independence. Enraged by what he claimed was a partisan and communal media, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru cracked down on press freedoms. Terrible, something terrible, he said of Indian journalism to the visitingscholar Michael Brecher. We put an end to it.

In 1950, the Supreme Court shot down the Government of Madras ban on the Left-wing weeklyCrossroads. Then, the court stopped the Delhi government from pre-censoring the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sanghs (RSS) magazineOrganiser. The government responded by resurrecting colonial-eraanti-free speech laws.

The Indian State also created a system of pelf and patronage to ensure it controlled the media. Even though the media sometimes fought back, it has rarely enjoyed genuine independence from the government.

Even though few of Imrans opponents have reason to shed tears for his fate, liberals fear whats passed for a democratic transition is coming to closely resemble military tyranny. Thecommentator Omar Warraich, among others, has thoughtfully noted that the real lesson is that the Generals need to be evicted from Pakistani politics. The chokehold of the military on ideas and debate has created a republic of fear.

For Indians, the crisis in Pakistan ought to be a reminder of just how fragile democratic freedoms areand how difficult they can be to resurrect when they have been allowed to crumble.

The author is National Security Editor, ThePrint. He tweets @praveenswami. Views are personal.

(Edited by Humra Laeeq)

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Pakistani Generals have a history of censoring media. Imran Khan is ... - ThePrint

Is censorship acceptable if it is well-meaning? Can changing the content of a writers or artists work be excused for so-called woke ends? The first few months of 2023 have seen these questions debated as publishers have edited out or rewritten objectionable content from writers as diverse as Enid Blyton and Roald Dahl to P G Wodehouse and Ian Fleming. The debate between morality (or whatever the name given to self-righteous zeal) and free speech will, of course, continue. But the argument for the right to speak and offend has been buttressed by its most prominent champion.

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The idea that James Bond could be made politically correct is almost comical, Salman Rushdie said, while accepting the Freedom to Publish honour at the British Book Awards earlier this week. Rushdie mentioned state censorship in several non-Western countries, including India, as a problem. However, in the West, things are no better and the attack on free expression is not coming directly from the state: here in the US, I have to look at the extraordinary attack on libraries and books for children in schools; the attack on the idea of libraries themselves. Its quite remarkably alarming, and we need to be very aware of it and fight against it very hard. Rushdies prescription is as simple as it is unheeded: Dont try and remake yesterdays work in the light of todays attitudes.

Last year, Rushdie was nearly killed for words he wrote. It is no small thing, then, that he sees the threats to speech today coming from attempts to bowdlerise works of writers like Dahl and Fleming by those who claim that political correctness is an excuse to censor. His words and the price he has paid for them hold a lesson for those who believe that they are entitled to mutilate works of art: Free speech is worth protecting, even and especially in the face of claims to virtue.

The Indian Express (P) Ltd

First published on: 19-05-2023 at 06:33 IST

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Express View: Rushdie isnt woke - The Indian Express

The lawsuit alleges a county in the Republican-led state is cracking down on access to books on race and LGBTQ identity.

A writers group and a book publisher in the United States have sued a school district in the southern state of Florida over efforts to restrict the availability of books about race and LGBTQ identity in libraries.

The group PEN America and the publisher Penguin Random House announced the lawsuit on Wednesday, alleging that the Escambia County School District and its school board violated the First Amendment of the US Constitution by removing 10 books on race and gender.

In Escambia County, state censors are spiriting books off shelves in a deliberate attempt to suppress diverse voices, Suzanne Nossel, CEO of PEN America, said in a statement. In a nation built on free speech, this cannot stand.

The lawsuit is the latest challenge to a series of conservative laws spearheaded by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, some of which have targeted gay and transgender people as well as critical perspectives on race in the US.

DeSantis, expected to challenge former President Donald Trump for the 2024 Republican US presidential nomination, has sought to bolster his right-wing credentials among conservative voters.

On Wednesday, DeSantis signed laws banning gender-affirming care for transgender youth, restricting the use of gender-neutral pronouns in schools, and forcing transgender youth to use bathrooms based on the sex they were assigned at birth.

The governor has also championed laws restricting access to books on topics such as LGBTQ rights and Black history, positioning himself as a crusader against wokeness, a term used dismissively by some Republicans to describe issues of race, gender and sexuality.

Campaigns to restrict access to books discussing that subject matter have become increasingly common in Republican-led states across the country, and library groups say that 2022 saw a record number of efforts to ban books.

Democratic politicians have sought to capitalise on those efforts by portraying Republicans as extremists seeking to curtail ideas and lifestyles they disagree with.

Around the country, MAGA extremists are lining up to take on those bedrock freedoms, cutting Social Security that you paid for your entire life, while cutting taxes for the very wealthy, dictating what healthcare decisions women can make, banning books and telling people who they can love, Democratic President Joe Biden said in the April video that launched his 2024 re-election campaign.

The acronym MAGA refers to Trumps Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement.

A February 2022 CBS poll found that more than 80 percent of respondents disagree with efforts to limit access to books that view US history with a critical lens and discuss sensitive issues of race.

The lawsuit in Florida states an art teacher objected to the books and asked for them to be removed. A district committee created to assess the suitability of library books recommended that they be kept in place but was overruled by the district, which then removed them.

The legal complaint alleges that, in every decision Escambia County has taken to remove a book, the school district has sided with a challenger expressing openly discriminatory opinions.

Not only do those removals therefore violate the First Amendment protections for free speech, but they also contradict the Fourteenth Amendment, which prevents discrimination on the basis of race, gender and sexual orientation, the lawsuit argues.

The targeted book removals we are seeing in Escambia County are blatantly unconstitutional attempts to silence and stigmatize, Nadine Farid Johnson, managing director of PEN America Washington and Free Expression Programs, said in Wednesdays press release.

The government should not foster censorship by proxy, allowing one person to decide what ideas are out of bounds for all.

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Censorship: US publisher sues over Florida book restrictions - Al Jazeera English

The Meridian Library on Cherry Lane is a popular place for residents to find books to check out, and find community resources and activities for all ages. Darin Oswald Idaho Statesman

Tuesday was a good day for freedom in Idaho.

In almost all cases, the forces of censorship far-right candidates whove attempted to take over local library boards took a thumping. Candidates who pledged that public libraries would remain places of free intellectual inquiry triumphed.

Perhaps the most hotly contested races were in Meridian, where there have been efforts to simply disband the district because the library has sex education books and books that make reference to the lives of gay people. Incumbent Destinie Hart, who has pledged to protect free expression, beat challenger Xavier Torres, who had signed the petition to disband the district, by more than a two-to-one margin. The results were essentially identical in the race between incumbent Josh Cummings and challenger David J. Tizekker.

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The pattern repeated at the Ada Community Library board, where anti-censorship candidates Mary Anne Saunders and Sandra Taylor prevailed over candidates who had pledged to govern the library according to conservative ideology.

And the trend of anti-censorship voting held up not just in the Treasure Valley but across much of the state. From North Idaho to eastern Idaho, library trustees committed to freedom generally prevailed.

The one exception was in Kootenai County, where pro-censorship challengers Tom Hanley and Tim Plass defeated incumbents Regina McCrea and Judy Meyer.

Hanley built his campaign on a lie. He pledged to protect children from the hardcore pornography that is available to children in our libraries, as the Coeur dAlene Press reported.

The assertions that libraries are full of porn and inappropriate material are ludicrous. But you can expect Hanley to call books he doesnt like pornography for the purposes of censoring them.

Kootenai County home to perhaps the most extreme faction of the Idaho Republican Party, which has increasingly been willing to link arms with characters like David Reilly is increasingly a pocket where censorship and indoctrination are advancing as freedom recedes.

Reilly has made shocking antisemitic statements, including Judaism is the religion of anti-Christ.

Reilly resigned from his job as a radio host in Pennsylvania after his supportive tweets and footage of the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, became public, as the Daily News of Newburyport reported. As the Inlander subsequently reported, four days before the rally, a user later identified in court testimony as Reilly suggested the idea that participants march straight through the commons with torches for the night rally for the purpose of producing propaganda footage. The footage Reilly posted after the rally, with advertisements for another rally the following day, was exactly the kind of propaganda footage discussed in the post.

First, they took over the community college, which is now a shambles, and now the library, which may soon follow.

But the damage has largely been contained to Kootenai. And, given the incessant calls for censorship, calls that became one of the central themes of the last two legislative sessions, thats reason to celebrate.

Statesman editorials are the unsigned opinion of the Idaho Statesmans editorial board. Board members are opinion editor Scott McIntosh, opinion writer Bryan Clark, editor Chadd Cripe and newsroom editors Dana Oland and Jim Keyser.

CORRECTION: This editorial has been updated to remove an out-of-context quote attributed to David Reilly and to remove an inaccurate statement about Reillys involvement in the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville.

Corrected May 17, 2023

This story was originally published May 17, 2023 11:12 AM.

Statesman editorials are the unsigned opinion expressing the consensus of the Idaho Statesmans editorial board. The editorial board is composed of journalists and community members and is separate from the Statesmans newsroom. Members of the editorial board are Statesman editor Chadd Cripe, opinion editor Scott McIntosh, opinion writer Bryan Clark and newsroom editors Jim Keyser and Dana Oland.

The editorial board meets weekly and sometimes invites subjects to board meetings to interview them personally to gain a better understanding of the topic. Board members also communicate throughout the week via email to discuss issues and provide input on editorials on topics as they are happening in real time. Editorials are intended to be part of an ongoing civil discussion with the ultimate goal of providing solutions to community problems and making this a better place to live, work and play.

Editorials reflect the collective views of the Statesmans editorial board not just the opinion of one writer. An editorial is a collective opinion based on a group discussion among members of the board members. While the editorial is written by one person, typically the opinion editor, it represents the opinions and viewpoints expressed by members of the editorial board after discussion and research on the topic.

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Idaho library election results are in. For the most part, freedom prevailed | Opinion - Idaho Statesman