Quote:
Originally Posted by arjaybe
It's not socially okay, of course. Thoughtful people don't act that way. Thoughtful people don't behave the way I think the "Twitter mob" must be acting, from the comments here. It's not nice-okay. It's still free expression-okay, though, and that's the okay I'm thinking of.
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It's not even a matter of socially acceptable. Think of okay as being reasonable. Generally people are free to behave unreasonably. People are free to criticise a book without reading it, and no one is suggesting otherwise. The question is whether doing so is reasonable. This thread shows that most think it is not, some unequivocally and some with exceptions.
I myself make an exception for books with real potential to cause real physical harm, for instance "Bomb making for Dummies", which I would even support banning, despite such bans being mostly ineffectual. However, what about similar practical instructions in a work of fiction? In the latter case I don't think it is reasonable to criticise the work without at least reading the offending part. And a ban or censorship? Probably a case by case decision.
But what about crimes not having to do with physical harm. What about laws which are unjust. Consider, for instance, "A Burglar's Guide to House Breaking and Lock Picking?" Or "The Pirate's guide to ignoring Copyright and Not Getting Caught?" Or, travelling back to the bad old days, "A Slave's Guide to Escape?" And the same in fiction? In "The Day of the Jackal" Frederick Forsyth famously went into great detail on the steps a character followed to obtain a false passport. This can be a very slippery slope indeed.