News
Education
Feb. 19, 2002
Dumping Books Sets Bad Precedent
Forum Column - By Ira L. Shafiroff - Two weeks ago, Los Angeles Unified School District officials removed 300 English- and Spanish-language copies of "The Meaning of the Holy Quran," a text and commentary on Islam's foundational work. The books, donated by a Los Angeles-based Muslim outreach organization, were removed after a school district history teacher complained that the book was anti-Semitic.
Forum Column
By Ira L. Shafiroff
Two weeks ago, Los Angeles Unified School District officials removed 300 English- and Spanish-language copies of "The Meaning of the Holy Quran," a text and commentary on Islam's foundational work. The books, donated by a Los Angeles-based Muslim outreach organization, were removed after a school district history teacher complained that the book was anti-Semitic. According to news reports, the book's commentary refers to Jews as illiterates who arrogantly reject knowledge. While a religious organization should not smear adherents of another religion, the school district should absolutely not engage in book banning, a practice that is constitutionally, logically and pedagogically unsupportable.
First, from a constitutional perspective, the action taken by the district almost certainly violates students' First Amendment rights. In Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District No. 26 v. Pico, 457 U.S. 853 (1982), a school district removed certain books from a school library because it deemed the books to be "vulgar." In a plurality opinion, the U.S. Supreme Court held that "local school boards may not remove books from school library shelves simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books and seek by their removal to prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion."
The First Amendment, we all are taught in high school, is not designed to protect popular speech. Rather, it is to protect ideas that do not have widespread support. The district may not like the offensive commentary in "The Meaning of the Holy Quran." As a Jew, neither do I. Nonetheless, being offended by what someone else writes or says is the price that all of us from time to time must pay to live in a free and open society. The alternatives are not pleasant.
Second, the action taken by the district is illogical. If the district had its way and disallowed all books that were offensive to Jews, legions of school library books would end up in the incinerator. We could start with Hitler's hysterics in "Mein Kampf," and add to that the works of Martin Luther, the father of the Reformation, whose rabid anti-Jewish writings compete with Hitler's for viciousness.
Moreover, if the district is so concerned with Jewish sensitivities, it also would ban the New Testament, which describes Jews as vipers, hypocrites and sons of Satan. Indeed, the Gospel of Matthew especially should be excised because of the verse, "His blood be upon us and on our children." This one sentence, reportedly shouted by a Jewish crowd demanding Jesus' execution, has been cited by theologians and scholars as the basis for 18 centuries of European anti-Semitism.
Moreover, even if district officials were successful in banning all books that offend Jews, they then would have to make sure that there are no books that offend any other religious, ethnic or racial group. Eventually, our school libraries would be empty of books.
Finally, while the actions of the district are legally and logically dubious, they also are pedagogically troubling. One would think that professional educators would understand that banning books in a school is incongruent with the mission of a school: to teach students to question and think critically. Instead of complaining about offensive passages in "The Meaning of the Holy Quran," the history teacher who brought this to the attention of district officials should have seized the opportunity to give students a wonderful lesson in thinking by challenging the offensive commentary in class through discussion and debate. The teacher also could have had students write papers on the subject and mail them to the outreach organization that donated the books, submitting a written challenge to the editors of the book. Unfortunately, by taking the books off the shelves, school officials lost a real opportunity to make an impression on developing young minds.
By banning the book, the district sends a loud and clear message to students: If people say something you find offensive, shut them down. Don't question them. Don't make them prove their case. Don't press them with facts or logic. Just make them be quiet.
Is this the message that we really want students to walk away with when they graduate from high school?
If banning books is the way school district officials deal with unpleasant ideas, they have made the case for school vouchers better than any critic of the public school system ever could.
Ira L. Shafiroff, a professor at Southwestern University School of Law in Los Angeles, is the author of "Every Christian's Book on Judaism."
By Ira L. Shafiroff
Two weeks ago, Los Angeles Unified School District officials removed 300 English- and Spanish-language copies of "The Meaning of the Holy Quran," a text and commentary on Islam's foundational work. The books, donated by a Los Angeles-based Muslim outreach organization, were removed after a school district history teacher complained that the book was anti-Semitic. According to news reports, the book's commentary refers to Jews as illiterates who arrogantly reject knowledge. While a religious organization should not smear adherents of another religion, the school district should absolutely not engage in book banning, a practice that is constitutionally, logically and pedagogically unsupportable.
First, from a constitutional perspective, the action taken by the district almost certainly violates students' First Amendment rights. In Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District No. 26 v. Pico, 457 U.S. 853 (1982), a school district removed certain books from a school library because it deemed the books to be "vulgar." In a plurality opinion, the U.S. Supreme Court held that "local school boards may not remove books from school library shelves simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books and seek by their removal to prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion."
The First Amendment, we all are taught in high school, is not designed to protect popular speech. Rather, it is to protect ideas that do not have widespread support. The district may not like the offensive commentary in "The Meaning of the Holy Quran." As a Jew, neither do I. Nonetheless, being offended by what someone else writes or says is the price that all of us from time to time must pay to live in a free and open society. The alternatives are not pleasant.
Second, the action taken by the district is illogical. If the district had its way and disallowed all books that were offensive to Jews, legions of school library books would end up in the incinerator. We could start with Hitler's hysterics in "Mein Kampf," and add to that the works of Martin Luther, the father of the Reformation, whose rabid anti-Jewish writings compete with Hitler's for viciousness.
Moreover, if the district is so concerned with Jewish sensitivities, it also would ban the New Testament, which describes Jews as vipers, hypocrites and sons of Satan. Indeed, the Gospel of Matthew especially should be excised because of the verse, "His blood be upon us and on our children." This one sentence, reportedly shouted by a Jewish crowd demanding Jesus' execution, has been cited by theologians and scholars as the basis for 18 centuries of European anti-Semitism.
Moreover, even if district officials were successful in banning all books that offend Jews, they then would have to make sure that there are no books that offend any other religious, ethnic or racial group. Eventually, our school libraries would be empty of books.
Finally, while the actions of the district are legally and logically dubious, they also are pedagogically troubling. One would think that professional educators would understand that banning books in a school is incongruent with the mission of a school: to teach students to question and think critically. Instead of complaining about offensive passages in "The Meaning of the Holy Quran," the history teacher who brought this to the attention of district officials should have seized the opportunity to give students a wonderful lesson in thinking by challenging the offensive commentary in class through discussion and debate. The teacher also could have had students write papers on the subject and mail them to the outreach organization that donated the books, submitting a written challenge to the editors of the book. Unfortunately, by taking the books off the shelves, school officials lost a real opportunity to make an impression on developing young minds.
By banning the book, the district sends a loud and clear message to students: If people say something you find offensive, shut them down. Don't question them. Don't make them prove their case. Don't press them with facts or logic. Just make them be quiet.
Is this the message that we really want students to walk away with when they graduate from high school?
If banning books is the way school district officials deal with unpleasant ideas, they have made the case for school vouchers better than any critic of the public school system ever could.
Ira L. Shafiroff, a professor at Southwestern University School of Law in Los Angeles, is the author of "Every Christian's Book on Judaism."
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