Quote:
Originally Posted by Joebill
I don't like the Nazis nor the Communists, but we should document the death camps and pogroms they engaged in.
But I see no reason to produce a how to book on how to conduct a pogrom or death camp.
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There may well be no reason someone we think of as a good person would write such a book. But when we give our government the power to say "Someone doesn't think you should write a book about
this" then we're giving away a very important right. We're letting someone else decide for us what kinds of books should be written. And when we let someone make that decision, history and the present day show us that they will decide that books which defame the state and its leaders, which disagree with its official philosophies, and which contradict its social theories, are very, very high on the list of books that should not be written. That is why it is the people and ideas on the margins, not in the mainstream, which need to be defended. When we let rights be eroded at the margins, all of a sudden we discover that those margins have moved inward and now include us.
For a case in point, look at Venezuela.