INFOGRAPHIC: Top Ten Banned Or Challenged Books Of 2010

To mark Banned Books Week (Sept 24-Oct 1), we've created an infographic to highlight the most banned or challenged books of last year. Click below to read more, and click here to read the President of the American Library Association on why censorship continues to threaten our freedom to read. We'll be posting more coverage of Banned Books Week events and commentary throughout the week.

Comments

[Annieke]

08:24 AM on 10/01/2011

Just the fact that it is apparently needed to have a 'Banned Book Week' says it all I guess.

I can't remember ever having read about a book being banned in The Netherlands with the possibble exception of Mein Kampf.

"Land of the Free" wasn't it? Apparently this means 'free from books others find disturbing' and not 'free to read whatever you want'.

[FalstaffsMind]

09:40 AM on 09/30/2011

I wonder if my 12 year old daughter would be disturbed that 2 of her favorite series made the list.

[aprilglaspie]

07:13 PM on 09/29/2011

And where is the "racism" in Sherman Alexie's Part-Time Indian. Is this the sad but all too common racism of native Americans that object to white Europeans having stolen their subcontinent?

[Dawn Castle]

07:12 PM on 09/29/2011

Nickel and Dimed? What's controversial about that? Can someone explain to me?

[Wookiee1972]

09:28 PM on 09/29/2011

From what I understand, Ehrenreich points out the hypocrisy of Christians who do not look after the poor and hungry.

[Annieke]

08:25 AM on 10/01/2011

How can a fact be controversial. I understand it can be considered disturbing by the so-called 'Christian' do-gooders in society but is that enough to ban a book?

Oh well, asking the question is the same as answering it, in this case.

[Skygazer]

12:28 PM on 09/30/2011

It's preposterous.

Certain people cannot stand to have a mirror held up to the cracks in their supposed "morality."

[aprilglaspie]

07:09 PM on 09/29/2011

Whe did "political viewpoint" become a valid criterion for banning a book. Shouldn't the entire list of Regnery Publishing be banned en masse?

[no-nonsense-fan]

12:04 PM on 09/29/2011

Haha, I'm all for banning Twilight

[Clairvoyant Evangelist]

10:29 PM on 09/28/2011

Interesting: I can't read the list of ten banned books because the list appears to be banned from my computer.

Is this a new HuffPost Parental Control Feature? Is there anyone who is not a parent who can check out the list for me, so I can read it?

I'll wait by the back door of the library. In the shadows there...

I don't understand even why parent have to be controlled on computers, anyway. Is someone afraid they might censor the content?

[Rusken]

11:17 AM on 09/29/2011

It's banned on my computer also, but I've come to expect less and less from HP lately.

[newscott]

04:09 PM on 09/29/2011

Yep, banned here also. Oh well.

[Nelsene McGinn]

05:11 PM on 09/28/2011

Who picks the books to ban? Do they read everything there is to read and then decide? Is it one person, 2 people, 12 people? Well, nobody speaks for me and thank goodness we live in a country that still allows us to pick out our books for ourselves. I am concerned, however, that given the right-wing climate (or is it just a media thing?) we may be coming to a time when we will not have a choice. God, I hope I'm wrong!!

[Clairvoyant Evangelist]

10:43 PM on 09/28/2011

Most book banners get the information they need from organizations that specialize in ferreting "awful" content from books and publications. These used to distribute through mailing lists to ministers, who were usually good candidates, always looking for something to spark up a sermon for a slow Sunday. Nowadays the lists are available on the internet. You can google for concerned parents, books bad for children, unchristian books and so forth. Then just find titles on their lists, read the blurb, to know why they should be banned, and march down to your library to look for them (or check the online catalog). Then print the form-letter provided by the web-site, sign it, or make your X, and send it. To become a bannable book reader you learn to skim for probable sections and then keywords. It helps, and you can be a group hero, if you found religion after a past life as a pervert, and so developed a radar for finding the "good parts" (which in your new life are "appalling".

[LMPE]

03:16 PM on 09/28/2011

I once saw a list of challenged books. It included Webster's Dictionary, because the dictionary defines curse words.

[Leo Mark]

04:25 PM on 09/28/2011

Jesus The Extraterrestrial is on this list???? http://JesusTheExtraterrestrial.com

[Elizabeth Lee Hammons]

01:29 PM on 09/28/2011

If anyone else has read The Hunger Games, please help me out. I cannot for the life of me figured out what "sexual content" is in that book. I can see where they would get violence, but sexual content? I have no idea.

[chibidraco]

03:05 PM on 09/29/2011

That one has me baffled too...the only thing I can reason out is that "sexual content" is being used as a very broad umbrella term, and somebody was offended by Katniss sleeping next to Peeta...?

[xzwq]

12:33 PM on 09/28/2011

Why is a ban or challenge needed? Your kids aren't going to want to read any of these books except for "Twilight," so no worries. Your r.e.t.a.r.d.e.d.n.e.s.s is safe.

[LMPE]

03:17 PM on 09/28/2011

With the "Twilight" series, they'll struggle to understand what the plot even is, as I did while watching one of the movies.

[ColleenHarper]

04:05 PM on 09/28/2011

My daughters all loved And Tango Makes Three. I plan on making sure my grandkids get to read it SOON! It's a very warm and loving book!

[bdoug25000]

12:04 PM on 09/28/2011

My children loved those books!

[OhCaptain]

11:56 AM on 09/28/2011

Wait, Brave New World wasn't pegged for drug use? So many of the people in the book are whacked out on soma most of the time.

I guess because it was used as a way for the government to systematically mollify and control the population, it must not be bad, right?

[ColleenHarper]

04:07 PM on 09/28/2011

Conservative control of the masses is perfectly fine with the people most inclined to ban books! Of course they WANT to discover a real Soma to use on Americans, especially those damned liberals!

I've yet to meet a liberal/progressive who is adamantly in favor of banning books.

[Wookiee1972]

04:39 PM on 09/28/2011

Then you haven't looked close enough.

Back in the 80s, there was a movement among feminists to get pornography recriminalized for ADULTS. They wanted to make it illegal for adults to by even Playboy and Penthouse. And these were not fringe groups - many of the leaders were praised by Ms. Magazine at the time.

As well, there are countless people who object to the alleged racism in Huckleberry Finn (or even, shockingly, To Kill A Mockingbird).

[Cacey]

07:42 AM on 09/28/2011

Good. Now I have my Christmas list started for the kids in my family. Thanks.

[MolliBlum]

09:24 AM on 09/28/2011

Fine -- but take note of Vrano's explanations downthread. Just because someone has objected to a book doesn't mean it's "subversive" in a good way. Twilight is a case in point: nasty anti-feminist / gender-stereotyping propaganda with very disturbing sexually repressive symbolism, guaranteed to thrill the pro-abstinence / anti-abortion crowd.

[BiasedPollster]

09:38 AM on 09/28/2011

- and those are just the good parts :D

[mollymac]

10:23 AM on 09/28/2011

Regardless, if we start banning books we will be no better than the religious book-burning crowd, the communist regime during the cold war, and the extreme religious right that wants control of everything!

[mollymac]

10:21 AM on 09/28/2011

There you go! Faved.

[Vrano]

06:31 AM on 09/28/2011

There is a huge misconception about "banned books." This misconception is that these are books that are banned so that no one can read them at all anywhere in the US. This is simply not true. As you can see by the map, these are mostly local challenges to either public libraries or public schools. Most of the time, the books are allowed to stay after a review of the complaints. But there is nothing preventing most of us from obtaining these books on our own should we want to.

[Syllogizer]

01:12 PM on 09/28/2011

Good point. This is why some of us think the American Library Association is making a mountain out of a molehill here, for their own political reasons: it is good publicity for them -- or so they think.

[Ben F]

10:42 PM on 09/28/2011

No one here actually thinks that, so no, it's not a common misconception. The only misconception is yours, and it's you thinking that you're smarter than anyone else.

[ColleenHarper]

04:22 AM on 09/29/2011

Thanks Ben! You cut right to the heart of the problem!