I know Florida, Texas, and other counties have tried and succeeded to ban books, I wonder how that is even legal since we have the first amendment. I tried doing research on this since Huntington Beach is banning books and people were petitioning against that at the main library.

I made a little post asking people to petition on the Orange County sub.

  • radix@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Bans often rely on the obscenity exception to the 1st Amendment:

    https://constitution.findlaw.com/amendment1/first-amendment-limits--obscenity.html

    SCOTUS has never given a clear, well-defined, repeatable test to say exactly what “obscenity” even means, so local jurisdictions are free to push the envelope.

    If that sounds like a pile of bullshit waiting to be exploited, yes, and that’s exactly why we’re seeing this happening.

    • pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online
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      5 months ago

      It’s not a 1A issue, though. The government isn’t restricting your ability to purchase or own the book, they’re just saying it can’t be used in schools.

    • Fubber Nuckin'@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      I wish there was no obscenity exception. I think all media deserves to exist regardless of its obscenity as long as it’s not directly harming someone (like certain types of porn for instance)

      • Kimano@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        The problem is the obscenity exception is also used for things like preventing someone from walking around a public park with a giant sign covered in gore porn. Something like that I think is obviously pretty okay to ban, but clearly it gets misused for a lot of homophobic/transphobic type stuff.

        • humorlessrepost@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          walking around a public park with a giant sign covered in gore porn

          anti-abortion protesters have entered the chat

          Just need to have a case for it being a political statement.