Let’s open that Overton window: sue B&N for showing The Bible to minors.
I guarantee any good argument for not banning The Bible will apply to any other book, so QED it’s a stupid thing to sue over in either case.
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People keep throwing that out there, but the reality is that I don’t think they want people to read the bible for themselves (although that’s a major basis of protestantism - the bible in vernacular, accessible to everyone rather than a priestly caste). They don’t want people to read and engage with the bible, but rather just accept pre-conceived interpretations of the bible, with people reading THAT version that’s pre-approved… they want to use it as an excuse for authoritarianism. They want a specific set of interpretations that is imposed on all people, led by particular people… So, no… threatening to ban the bible isn’t particularly the pwn some people seem to believe it to be… Because there are lots of different bibles out there, some of which, they would very much like to ban.
A better pwn might be to point out how they are imposing one set of interpretations on people, which was what the whole protestant reformation started out about (that and corruption in the church - which you can also easily point to among white evangelicals!).
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You’ve sort of strawmanned my argument, which is actually that nobody should be suing anybody about the contents of a book.
I think if the Satanic Temple suggested they’d sue, for reasons, that would probably be performative enough to suggest how hypocritical the original, actual suit is.
Nevertheless: I agree that authoritarians don’t want people reading and engaging with The Bible now for any less nefarious reasons than the Church did back in Luther’s time.
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Indeed. Anything using language more recent than mid-17th century.
Pretty sure most modern evangelicals wouldn’t recognize Martin Luther as their kind of xtian. Or many other early reformers, either.
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Well, duh, I got that. I agree with that. But the “well, we’ll just ban the bible” almost always comes up in these arguments, and there are serious reasons why it’s not the pwn people believe it to be. Of course, no one should ban books. Have you ever known me to argue otherwise? 
Except they seem relatively immune to charges of hypocrisy. They are not working off rationale and logic, but off the premise that they NEED to impose their ideology on all of us. The hypocrisy is part of that. They are well aware of it (as well as the sins of their leadership), but they do not care, because the ends justify the means.
Acting like we can reason with these people is a pretty big folly. We might be able to convince some on the right, but given how much control they have over the GOP right now, does that matter if the hardcore will forge ahead and continue to accrue power to take things over? We might be past that point…
They recognize some idealized version of him, sticking it to the “satanic” Pope… Same with other reformers. They’re not basing their views on actual history, but on their twisted version of it.
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In Frank Miller’s version, they purged all the non-white, non-“perfect”, non-straight warriors from the Spartans. So yes.
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Maybe the idea was to just get them all discharged.
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I haven’t actually watched it but I’ve always heard that it was one of the most “unintentionally homoerotic” movies ever. The marketing material certainly had no shortage of scantily clothed, greased-up muscle-bound gentlemen. Kinda like the WWE in that respect.
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Here’s a summary.
Except they don’t really get into it, but you have to understand that Persians here means people who are either pretty queer like Mindy said, or actual not-quite-human orcs.
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So, like I said, pretty much like the WWE then?
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It was pretty ridiculous that the war was characterized as “white Europeans fighting for freedom against evil Persian slavers” considering that the Greeks practiced slavery at the time while the Persians did not.
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The claim that Persians didn’t practice slavery strikes me as extremely doubtful, especially considering they had people like Greeks and Babylonians living in their empire and didn’t interfere much in the local cultures. When I have looked into it, all I have found is a very questionable reading of the Cyrus cylinder originally from Iranian nationalists. I think it’s a patriotic myth.
That said, not only was slavery a very normal part of ancient Greece, but Sparta in particular really went all in on it. The vast majority of the population were helots – publicly owned slaves – treated so poorly even the other Greeks thought it was cruel. They actually declared war on them each year so they could kill and rape with impunity unusual among slavers. And then the handful of non-slaves were in a system with a surprising number of classes, all but the top with limited rights, and no mobility except down. I think they might be the least free society on record.
But, you know, they didn’t answer to people from other cities, which is what freedom means in the context of Herodotus. 
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Fair enough, should have taken that translation of the Cyrus cylinder with a grain of salt. Still silly portraying the Sparta as some principled bastion of freedom and human rights.
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it’s the fear of strange new customs, and the fear of being ruled by someone who does not even pretend to understand you.
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Yeah, I’ve often said they wouldn’t recognize Jesus, either - based on how they behave. 
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Well, the wrong books, anyway.
Or for those books to even exist.
First, of course, it will be the books; then it will be the stores & libraries.
Bans & burnings of books have already started.
Says the lawyer.
I smell a grift.
Yep.
Gonna be a long, hot summer.
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“Never trust a person who only read one book”
Arturo Perez-Riverte
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We are in a major fight. Suits like this can be filed all over Virginia. There are dozens of books. Hundreds of schools," he said, while gleefully rubbing his hands and drooling.
Fixed it for you. Not all Lawyers are grifting ambulance chasers; but, then, it is equally true, that not all serial killers love their mothers.
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