Undoubtedly, there are those in society who view censorship as a dying issue. One article, in particular, is famous (or perhaps infamous) for its response to the Banned Books Week (BBW) campaign, which is sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA). Ruth Graham’s “Banned books week is a croc” makes quite a few claims that undercut the severity of censorship as a societal concern, using information from the ALA’s own reports. Graham states that the ALA and BBW engage in “fear-mongering over censorship” (2015) to further its own cause, and that censorship is all but extinct in America, as the amount of books actually removed from libraries are much lower than the amount of books reported or challenged. Both of these claims are detrimental to the protection against censorship.

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    From that first confiscated pamphlet (discussed in the History section) to present day, censorship in America has come a long way. In this regard, Graham is not wrong. She states that: “if your local library declines to carry what you want to read these days, there has been no time in history where it’s easier for you to read it anyway” (2015). This is absolutely true; thanks to legal suits like the Pico case, it has become significantly harder for public institutions to ban books. However, it is the intentions of BBW that are severely misconstrued.

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    The primary goal of BBW is to draw attention to and celebrate the ability to read freely. (Whether the tone is a bit facetious is debatable.) This is expressed quite plainly in BBW’s slogan: “celebrating the freedom to read.” It is meant to inspire, to encourage people to read, not to trick society into fearing censorship. The ALA selects which books have been the most challenged throughout the year and promotes them. Often times, the most challenged books are simultaneously the most popular books by societal standards, at any given time in social history. For example, The Catcher in the Rye, 1984 and To Kill a Mockingbird are among the most repeatedly challenged books (Butler University, n.d.) in American history; more recent titles include The Hunger Games and  Fifty Shades of Grey. While there are many more, these are just some of the more notable titles. Because society has continuously fought to keep censorship at bay, BBW works as a way to honor that effort and to keep the topic fresh in the public’s mind. If the ALA did not run this campaign every year, censorship as an issue could very well fade into a non-issue, as Graham demonstrates with her second claim.

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    More importantly is Graham’s claim that book banning isn’t a serious issue in modern society. She first claims that books are not, and generally cannot, be banned anymore due to instances like the Pico case (in which it was ruled that school boards cannot remove books they may personally find offensive). Granted, it is true that in recent years actual book removal from libraries (school or public) has been lower than in the past: the ALA reports that between 2007 - 2012, only 4 books were “completely removed from circulation” (Graham, 2015). This statistic, in comparison to the thousands of books challenged, is all but nonconsequential.

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  However, by her own admission, Graham states that “there’s evidence that the small annual number of these instances is ticking upward” (2015). The Huffington Post reports that from 2012 to 2013, there was a 53% increase in book banning incidents: 49 incidents across 29 states in 2013 (2013). The main reason for book banning is sexually explicit content; other popular reasons include profanity, nudity, violence, homosexuality, drugs and novels that oppose religious (often Catholic/ Christian) beliefs (Crum, 2013). It is also reported that books written by “minority authors” (n.a., 2013) tend to be banned or challenged for portraying culturally relevant hardships that are deemed inappropriate. On December 1 of this year, classic novels The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and To Kill A Mockingbird were removed from the premises in response to one parent’s complaint over racial slurs (NBC), although these books use racial slurs to illustrate “an accurate picture of the period and all its ignorance” (Cellania, 2011), meant to be used as learning tools-- not to perpetuate hate and racism. Perhaps the sudden rise in censorship is linked to a rising awareness of and sensitivity to political incorrectness. It could be possible that the confrontation of uncomfortable ideas (Hellenstein, 2016) is causing a classic, knee-jerk reaction (Cellania, 2011) to the material at hand.

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    In any case, these instances, all very recent, prove that while society has made a drastic impact in the fight against censorship, the issue itself continues to persist. It also proves that BBW is still relevant and necessary in drawing attention to censorship issues, even in modern society.

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    With all this in mind, it is easy to assume that censorship really is not a serious problem anymore. But one very troubling aspect of Graham’s argument is the way in which she uses the term. By referring solely to BBW, Graham limits the term ‘censorship’ to a strictly literary context. While this is the most traditional context, it is not the only context.

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    Technology has advanced faster than ever before and continues to expand at a seemingly endless rate. The internet alone is something previous generations only dared to dream about. Yet in modern times, it is a mundane reality, so ingrained in the everyday lives of millions that we sometimes don’t even notice anymore. Cyberspace has developed so far beyond its original purpose, even in the past twenty years. The world is larger and more accessible than ever.

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    That being said, there are many more avenues in which information is shared, sometimes legally, sometimes illegally. The internet is driven by user content; without users, without people feeding information into these digital spaces, the internet comes to a halt. It is society that fuels cyberspace. User generated content, many times inspired by external sources, have become the focus of big corporations and lawmakers alike. New issues are arising: who has the right to control information output, especially in a space where information is supposed to be limitless? Who gets compensated? When do they get compensated? Who does the information belong to? Censorship comes in many forms, and is very dangerous because of that. It is not a strictly literary issue; books are not the only medium that can be censored. What Graham fails to recognize is that censorship is simply happening somewhere else-- it is moving from the page to the screen. Less people are focusing on books because they are looking towards the internet.

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