Floriduh- We Ban Bookz, 'Cuz Readin's Fer Brainiak's and Libruls

Two smart fer there own dam gud

Since I’m vacationing in the South, I thought it only natural to write about the South….

Floriduh is many things, but one thing it seems to excel at is banning books. Since July 2021, the “WTF?” State has banned more than 200 books, placing them third among all states. Banning books in Floriduh has been made even easier by the Floriduh Legislature passing and Gov. Ron DeSantis signing House Bill 1467 into law. Any parent can use HB 1467 to challenge books “purportedly aimed at empowering parents to protect their children's impressionable minds.”

Yes, you can never go too far when you’re trying to protect the young ‘uns from woke Librul ideas like compassion, kindness, and tolerance. F’rinstance, no REAL American wants teachers indoctrinating children with the idea that being LGBTQ is “normal” or “acceptable.” Not when children are being taught at home or in church to hate those who are LGBTQ. PARENTS should be the ones instilling proper morals and values in their offspring, not some woke Librul teacher who’s probably gay and not even from Floriduh.

Of course, if you’re going to ban books, you can’t claim to be surprised when someone decides to use your tactics against you. It turns out that White Conservative Christian heterosexuals aren’t the only ones who can use HB 1467 to ban a book they find offensive:

With that in mind, local political stunt activist Chaz Stevens of Deerfield Beach has taken it upon himself to add another book to the lengthy list: the Bible. This week, in letters sent to superintendents in eight school districts in Florida — including Miami-Dade County Public Schools (MDCPS) and Broward County Public Schools (BCPS) — Stevens, an avowed atheist, petitions the districts to ban the Christian Bible from classrooms and libraries, citing its inclusion of inappropriate topics.

"If they're gonna ban books, then the whole library should be in play. My hope — and it's a longshot — is that they will apply their own standards to themselves and ban the Bible," Stevens tells New Times.

Free-speech and literary-expression advocates have been sounding the alarm about what they see as a bureaucratic, authoritarian attack on education in Florida, particularly after recent news that the state rejected 54 math textbooks from the curriculum for allegedly containing prohibited topics such as "Critical Race Theory." When the state went so far as banning math books, Stevens says, he was inspired to use the same bureaucracy to strike back against the conservative wave with an operation he calls "Eff Off Jesus."

Let’s face it; anyone who hasn’t fallen prey to the Christian fallacy that the Bible is the inerrant word of God recognizes that the Bible is full of errors, contradictions, exhortations to violence, sex, and generalized mayhem.

It’s definitely not the sort of thing impressionable children should be reading. But, we live in an imperfect world and double standards abound; yes, even among Christians.

"I wish to file such an objection, requesting the Miami-Dade County Public School system immediately remove the Bible from the classroom, library, and any instructional material," Stevens writes in his request addressed to MDCPS Superintendent Jose Dotres on April 19. "And, as is often the case with banned books, I ask your agency lay flame to that giant stack of fiction in a pyre worthy of a Viking sendoff."

Stevens cites age inappropriateness, social-emotional learning, mentions of bestiality and rape, and "wokeness" as reasons to ban the Bible. Each reason is accompanied by a corresponding Bible excerpt. (A copy of Stevens' letter is attached at the end of this article).

"With the constant babbling concerns about teaching Critical Race Theory, should we not take stock of the Bible’s position on slavery? I am concerned our young white students will read such passages and wake up to civilization’s sordid past," Stevens writes, followed by a passage from Ephesians that speaks of slaves and servants obeying their masters.

Lest anyone believe that Stevens is joking, rest assured that he most assuredly is not. He’s taking his petition every bit as seriously as those seeking to ban books they believe are advocating Critical Race Theory (CRT) or homosexuality.

"They better not fucking ignore me," Stevens warns. "If they ignore me, doesn't that tell you something? The government can't pick and choose religion, but can they choose which books they review for banning and which ones they don't?"

True enough. The First Amendment to the Constitution expressly forbids preferential treatment of one religion over others- in this case atheism. HB 1467 can’t be used to advance a “Christian” agenda- as if any reasonable person could call what Floriduh Conservatives are doing “Christian.” They’re about as devoted to the teachings of Jesus Christ as I am the preferred masseuse of the Swedish Bikini Team.

Banning the Bible isn’t really such a bad idea if you think about it. Especially when you consider why parents are demanding why other books should be banned. After all, do we really want our young ‘uns learnin’ about fornication, rape, and conception- immaculate or otherwise? Isn’t that the sort of thing we should be protecting their precious little minds from?

Besides, what about the argument that there are things children should only be learning from their parents and not from a teacher who may be a gay communist atheist and may be corrupting children as we speak?

Don’t parents have the ultimate right to corrupt the minds of their children as they see fit? In Floriduh, the answer’s an unqualified “YES!!!,” Praise Be to Gov. Ron De Santis. But what people don’t realize is that HB 1467 is a two-way street that can be used against them just as easily as it can be used to support their agenda.

Also — "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" is the exact sort of woke, Social Emotional Learning that good, decent Republicans are fighting against all over America. The kind of nonsense that destroys our beautiful American tradition of bullying children who are different badly enough so that they move far, far away as soon as they graduate, leaving small towns blissfully free of adult nonconformists. Children don't need to learn "empathy" or "how to navigate social situations" from school. They can learn it from their parents and those that don't will just shoot the school up anyway before they graduate and no one will have to deal with them after that. Just the way God intended.

Also- if someone could define “woke” for me, I’d greatly appreciate it. “Woke” seems to be Gov. DeSantis’ bogeyman word of the moment, and it appears to encompass every bad thing about the Left. Yet the definition is, from what I can tell, one of the most fungible things in today’s lexicon.

The truth is that Floriduh parents want the absolute right to raise their progeny to be as ignorant and hateful as they are. After all, it’s worked for them, so why wouldn’t they want the same for their kids? Especially since they don’t know any different?

And you wonder why the “Floriduh Man” descriptor is often so very applicable? It’s not because there are so many Nobel Prize winners emerging from the Sunshine State.

For my part, if you believe in the appropriateness of a book that explicitly instructs readers not to have sex with animals (Leviticus 18:23) or that slavery may be a good thing (Ephesians 6:5-7), we might have a problem. If a school textbook taught such things, parents would justifiably be enraged. Do it in the Bible, though, and it’s just so much Christian wisdom to be imparted to the young ‘uns.

WTF?? (Jack 1:2-3)

If we’re concerned about parental rights, shouldn’t we also be concerned about the rights of students? Why do Floriduh politicians and parents assume that children want to grow up to be as prejudiced and ignorant as they are? Why not find out from children what they want to learn? Instead of assuming they want to grow up to be as stupid and bigoted as their parents, how about finding out what their dreams and aspirations might be?

Call me crazy, but I’m willing to hazard a guess that at least some children want a better life for themselves. I’m guessing some of them don’t want to spend their lives chasing snakes and ‘gators and hating Black people and non-Christians.

Then again, what do I know? I’m just another Yankee outsider telling Floridians what they should do, right?? Perhaps ignorant and bigoted works for them. Maybe they don’t enjoy critical thinking ‘cuz it makes their brain hurt. It could be that they really DO enjoy being told who to hate and fear.

‘Cuz who needs that kind of headache, right?

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