It's Banned Books Week!

From October 5th to the 11th, settle in with a banned or otherwise challenged book. It's that time of year to read something that someone else doesn't want you to read. It's time to celebrate your freedom to choose your own books and to honor those 1st Amendment Rights.

Right now, in this country it isn't legal to truly ban books from public consumption, but it is possible to have them pulled from libraries, schools, and certain bookstores, making them harder to access. However there are people who are actively fighting for that to change, that is for books that they find offensive to be pulled from shelves everywhere. Which to me is ludicrous. You can't currently and shouldn't ever be allowed to tell other people what they can and cannot do because you won't do it yourself. I, for example, don't eat onions, but I'm not refusing to let other people eat onions nor am I advocating that farmers be forbidden from growing onions.

If you're wondering what could make a book so bad that people want it banned, sadly it can be almost anything: race, mental health, LGBTQA themes, sexual content, violence... Heck, I remember that Harry Potter was accused of teaching children the occult.

All you have to do to join the weeklong rebellion is pick up a challenged book and read it. If you'd like to join in but aren't sure where to start check out this great list on GoodReads of The Best Banned, Censored, and Challenged Books ; or you can visit BannedBooksWeek.org and the American Library Association for more information on Banned Books Week.