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Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

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Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#481

Post by ldh0011 »

epicureanideal wrote: post #418
PuppyTailWags wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, schooling children at all is ideological: it's literally built on the ideology that we should have an educated populace. I'm really confused by this statement.

Indoctrinating children with views that their parents would object to is not the proper purpose of public education. The vast majority of parents are happy for their children to learn reading, writing, arithmetic, and so on. Specific political views, or that people with their skin color inherited historical evil, is something else entirely.

Reading, writing, arithmetic... not always science though right? I bet a good chunk of parents don't want evolution taught in schools. A smaller but significant chunk probably don't want climate change taught in environmental science either.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#482

Post by ldh0011 »

kadoban wrote: post #329
cat_plus_plus wrote: post #301

The law only applies to visual or graphic sexual content. I would hope everyone agrees that providing certain sexual materials to kids of certain age should be a felony. I hope everyone also agrees that sometime before puberty one should get appropriate sex education with approval of parents or guardians or say a judge if parents are proven to be completely unreasonable. I see the problem of Florida law being too vag…

> (b) Any book, pamphlet, magazine, printed matter however reproduced, or sound recording that contains any matter defined in s. 847.001, explicit and detailed verbal descriptions or narrative accounts of sexual excitement, or sexual conduct and that is harmful to minors. That's ambiguous as hell. Give that it's Florida, I'd expect them to have a biased view of what's "harmful" as well. That also rules out several of…

Furthermore, matters defined in s. 847.001 include "Nudity," "Sexual battery," and "Sexual conduct" defined pretty much as you'd expect but without any reference to would-be exonerating literary context.

If you inject part of the definition of "knowingly" in 847.012 1a into 3b you end up with something like:

"A person may not knowingly provide to a minor a printed item containing any matter defined in s. 847.001 if the person has knowledge of the character and content of any material described in this section which is reasonably susceptible of examination by the defendant/provider and which warrants further inquiry."

I'm not proficient in legalese but there exists a reading of this where I can't hand 1984 or To Kill a Mockingbird to my (hypothetical) 17 year old child without committing a felony because I have knowledge of the character and content of the books. Both reference rape and at least 1984 has sexual acts as part of the narrative (maybe TKaM too, it has been a minute since reading it). A series like ASOIAF would be similarly impacted and maybe even some young adult books I read while in high school.

Maybe the written works have to have no literary value for their distribution to be made illegal? That certainly isn't obvious though, is incredibly subjective, and the statutes are incredibly vague. Very puritanical and regressive imo.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#483

Post by kadoban »

cat_plus_plus wrote: post #477
kadoban wrote: post #471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a problem mostly because it has unhealthy romantic relationships in it that aren't examined well. The sex is largely besides the point. Any kid who wants to has seen things far more graphic on the internet. What are we protecting kids from exactly? That book would be a problem even if it were rated G.

Adults providing sexually explicit materials to kids makes it easier for same or other adults doing sexual things to these kids later. A boy sneaking a peek at dad's dirty magazine does not have the same effect, it remains a forbidden fruit. Now obviously Florida politicians have exaggerated the issue to keep their base outraged and showing up to vote, that's what politicians do. But the reason the outrage is easy to…

> But the reason the outrage is easy to whip up is because schools have been ignoring good taste and common sense for desire of some teachers to impose their value system on young generation rather than leaving values largely to each family. And kids suffer because of irresponsibility of both sides.

One side is teachers, the other side is politicians drumming up outrage. This isn't a both sides thing. These people making these laws know they can get their base pissed off at some culture-war nonsense so they're going for it.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#484

Post by mcv »

SauciestGNU wrote: post #469
slowmovintarget wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I think the disconnect is that some parents see children as property to be managed and controlled, and many other adults see children as individuals with agency and autonomy (to the extent that is developmentally appropriate). I also believe that most of this backlash is about children being able to freely access information that contradicts their parents' worldview. I have also seen strict parents punish their child…

Exactly. Conservatives try to paint this as protecting their kids from left-wing ideology, but it's really about being able to force right-wing ideology on them.

I'd strongly prefer exposing kids, in an age-appropriate manner, of course, to the whole breadth of human ideology and life experiences, with different views on it, and teaching them to think for themselves.

But mostly, I've got a kid that's struggling to read, but has a couple of very strong interests (trains!) that I leverage to get him to read more. Restricting the diversity of books available because they need to go through some slow approval process first, will make it harder for him to access books that he's eager to read. Because the whitelisting process means that even books that aren't even the slightest bit objectionable, won't necessarily be available, and may have to wait until more mainstream books have been approved.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#485

Post by froh »

ldh0011 wrote: post #476
agloeregrets wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Additionally, the content of the book has to pass rather insane content rules, including banning any description or implication of homosexuality. Wildly, they branded it as 'Parents rights' as in: "If I don't want my kid to read X...NOBODY's should". The outcome is an attempt to whitewash out topics that are inconvenient to the agenda at play to protect the agenda long term. $5 says it just makes teen pregnancy happe…

According to the article > The law requires that all library books selected be: > 1. Free of pornography and material prohibited under s. 847.012. s. 847.012. includes... > (3) A person may not knowingly sell, rent, or loan for monetary consideration to a minor: > (b) Any book, pamphlet, magazine, printed matter however reproduced, or sound recording that * contains* any matter defined in s. 847.001, ... s. 847.001 i…

> ~puritanical~

fascist, neo-feudal

FTFY

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#486

Post by yakireev »

seanw444 wrote: post #408
yakireev wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I will not contribute my money to a government that does not allow me my rights, and will also not disarm myself Out of curiosity, do you ever travel out of your country? If yes, how do you deal with the gun issue? If no, how do you feel about being locked within your national borders?

I personally don't feel the desire to visit other countries. If it's not somewhere I'd want to live, it's not somewhere I really care enough about to see. I care more about experiences and knowledge, both of which can be had where I live. It helps that my state is also comparable in size to larger European countries. And has a pretty dynamic environment. Very mountainous and foresty in the north, planey in the east,…

Being rather varied in nature, the U.S. is still just one country. It is culturally more diverse than some places, but that's still mostly one culture, one way of living, one way of thinking about things. Since you can't leave, you're confined to it and have no way to experience other cultures.

I guess that does not bother you, but what are your thoughts on this anyway?

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#487

Post by villasns »

danaris wrote: post #261
alexb_ wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me be clear that I do not agree at all, in any way with this argument, I'm just answering your question as to what the opinion of people who like this think. There are books which contain explicit depictions of sex between teenagers. Why do you want teenagers thinking that having sex before you are 18 is normal? Kids shouldn't be reading stuff about sex (gay, straight, or otherwise) before they are adults. The on…

Here's the thing: The argument you have articulated there, whether you agree with it or not, is not actually what is being argued (or at least is not all that is being argued). It's not actually primarily "books which contain explicit depictions of sex between teenagers" that are being challenged by this. It's books talking about the existence of gay, trans, and other queer people as something other than a horrible s…

The problem with some of these books is that they normalise horrendous practices, e.g. extreme sex acts like anal fisting, or extreme body modifications like young girls having their breasts amputated because they have a false belief that they are boys.

The books that just talk about standard sex education and give an overview of sexuality aren't a problem. It's these other ones that attempt to push the boundaries to their extremes, that parents and teachers are pushing back on.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#488

Post by danaris »

villasns wrote: post #487
danaris wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's the thing: The argument you have articulated there, whether you agree with it or not, is not actually what is being argued (or at least is not all that is being argued). It's not actually primarily "books which contain explicit depictions of sex between teenagers" that are being challenged by this. It's books talking about the existence of gay, trans, and other queer people as something other than a horrible s…

The problem with some of these books is that they normalise horrendous practices, e.g. extreme sex acts like anal fisting, or extreme body modifications like young girls having their breasts amputated because they have a false belief that they are boys. The books that just talk about standard sex education and give an overview of sexuality aren't a problem. It's these other ones that attempt to push the boundaries to…

So you think being trans is fake and comparable with anal fisting. Cool cool. That means you are precisely one of the people I described, trying to ban books about the existence of gay, trans, and other queer people.

I guarantee you there aren't more than 1 or 2 parents or teachers in the entire country (possibly not even that many, but there's always some nutcase somewhere) who genuinely think that having books on anal fisting available to elementary schoolers is a good thing.

Books on being trans aren't remotely comparable. And, just as an aside, if someone realizes they're trans before they go any significant amount through puberty, they can take very safe hormone treatments in order to ensure they never have to have more expensive and potentially traumatic surgery to present as their true gender.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#489

Post by motohagiography »

crooked-v wrote: post #456
motohagiography wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There isn't a bland news source that covers the stories of parents reading the explicit content out loud from books at their kids' schools at school board meetings, but it is common enough that Florida responded to it with legislation. If you would like to track down the stories that made the legislation viable, those instances are where I would recommend starting. The most recent example in the news was from a contr…

Or, to put it in other words, all you can offer is more rumormongering and fearmongering bullshit that isn't even correct about what actually happened: a single teacher once accidentally showed the wrong version of the educational film The Mask You Live In [1] to 12-year-olds in 2019, which accidentally exposed to them to a few more minutes of knowing that blurred-out pornography exists, and a single parent complaine…

To be clear, I offered a concievable and logical rationale for the Florida legislation that was based on summaries of the ideas that moved the people and legislators to implement it. The intent was ideally someone should be able to respond to it with something smarter.

There are more instances than the one this comment references.

However, I will elaborate further on the ideas of Arendt and Desmet that the object of the overarching movement is to make sure that individuals believe and trust nothing, even their own senses, because it will prevent them from resisting the small cadre of people who have historically followed these tactics with violence and terror to subordinate populations. The root of all social "theory," is to produce intellectually stultifying gibberish engines. It's chaff. Their jargon is designed to cost you time, create uncertainty, and "neutralize" you so that the sufficient condition of good men doing nothing is met.

The charitable rationale for people revolting against social justice in schools is that they recognize it is disingenuous, and that it's incumbent on the advocates of these theories to demonstrate that they are compassionate, honest, magnanimous, humane, and exercise other positive viritues, as if they aren't, you probably don't want them near your kids.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#490

Post by red-iron-pine »

jonathankoren wrote: post #174
jackson1442 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've even allowed veterans to teach without credentials for up to 5 years (while working on a degree and teaching certificate): https://www.reuters.com/world/us/amid-us-teacher-shortage-fl...

If you can fix a M2A2 Bradley, you’re qualified to teach calculus? I’m not sure I follow.

Bradleys are complicated and require some technical knowledge.

The lowest scores on the ASVAB are for things like cooks or truck drivers, or things like fuel filtration specialists aka gas station attendants in cammo.

None are qualified to teach Calc I but some might not be qualified to teach much of anything.

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