Another person objected to the Little Free Libraries because "anything" could be put in them. They didn't seem to mean drugs. I think it was porn they were worried about, though who knows, conservatives call everything porn these days. For examples, the very existence of a trans person or a gay person in a book makes that book pornography. (Hence the outrage because a public library had a copy of Alison Bechdel's Fun Home.)
Honestly, about nine-tenths of being conservative is being afraid of things which are harmless. Do they fear an armed man in a grocery store? Heavens, no, that is simply a fella practicing the Second Amendment.
Do they fear a woman in a hijab? Why, of course! A woman with purple hair? Even scarier! A trans woman in public. OH MY GOD.
Vaccines scare them so much they prefer to risk their lives and their children's lives rather than get a few shots. This also risks the herd immunity that protects the immunocompromised and infants too young for vaccines, but that is fine, their irrational fears trump everything. (Pun intended.)
You might remember the whole mask uproar -- conservatives accused the rest of us of being "afraid" of COVID, unlike them. They didn't fear a little virus! And when Arkansas was passing a law that made concealed carry on university campuses legal, conservatives sneered. What were liberals afraid of, that they didn't want armed people wandering around on campus?
That's projection for you. They're so afraid of, well, everyone that carrying weapons everywhere seems, to them, sensible. But if we object to trying to teach sonnets while several people in the classroom are packing heat, we're the ones who are afraid.
So, obviously, books are too scary for conservatives. Anyone can read them; any idea at all might be in there; and even little children might learn to think for themselves.
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It did amuse me that I picked up American Psycho from a streetside little free library, when here in QLD it is categorised R18 and may still technically be illegal to sell un-wrapped? I did return it to another little free library when I was done with it, although to one inside a bar.
I had to look up what R18 meant. Interesting! Is Queensland the only place that had this method of controlling print media? (I can see it catching on with our conservatives here in the US.)
Though to be sure our conservatives don't care about violence. It's the existence of LGBTQ people and of brown people and of sex that gets them shrieking.
I also think they're concerned very concerned about magic and witchcraft.
I know they used to be, but are they still? Now that Rowling is their best friend and all.
I think you're right that it's not the primary focus currently. In combination with sex, race, and LGBTQ content, it's up there, maybe just making something obviously bad even worse?
They *were^ but since jk rawling came out as horrible they seem to be ok with it now. DC2 has read “magic” books in school for class but DC1 never did.
An question that I had to do a little googling about - the classifications are at the national level - but the individual states manage them separately - QLD is the most restrictive, I believe wrapping requirements are generally more in relation to actual porn rather than literature.
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