Book Ban Quotes

“I'm not, like, a book guy, but isn't the point of all this book stuff like what Ms. Croft was teaching us -- that unrestricted access to books allows us to be challenged and changed? To learn new things and to critically think about those things and not be afraid of them? To be better than we were before we read them?”
― David Connis, Suggested Reading

“There are lessons to be learned from history — but generally those lessons are only known to those who read books, not to those who ban them.”
― Brian Dunning

“America cannot mend if its wounds are constantly covered.”
― Malika J. Stevely, Song of Redemption: A southern historical saga inspired by true events

“Truth is the greatest of all national possessions. A state, a people, a system, which suppresses the truth or fears to publish it, deserves to collapse as rapidly and completely as possible.”
― Kurt Eisner

“Book Bans Are Dumb
(Sonnet 1587)

Book bans are dumb,
It makes the mind numb.
If banning books were justice,
Middle ages would've been fun.

I’ve got Mein Kampf on my shelf,
next to bible, quran and vedanta.
You cannot fathom the wholeness of life,
if you let expansion be dictated by law.

Expansion can't be contained by law,
concocted in the gutter of tribalism.
Burning books doesn't prevent darkness,
It only obstructs illumination.

Book bans are dumb,
it makes the world numb.
Read reason, fiction, the lot -
Stretch your mind beyond medieval vision.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“Ban bombs, not books.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“Books can look dangerous or precious, depending on which side you're looking from, from office or from the streets.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Tierra Carta: Naskar Charter of Earth

“Earthlog 3002-3003

In many of the monkey nations of earth
their local governments often ban books,
and yet not a single earth country
has banned guns, not a single one -

in some countries you just need money,
in some countries you need a licence,
in others you need to be a soldier or copper,
but not a single country has actually banned guns,
they even ban websites and apps at the slightest
political inconvenience, but never guns.

These are the same animals that
claim to be an intelligent species,
they even cook up aristocratic names
for themselves, such as "sapiens",
meaning wise, or "humanity", implying
qualities like kindness and tolerance!

For a species only a couple of hundred thousand
years old, these hairless apes do have some
intelligence, there's no doubt about that,
but their intelligence seems to have a knack
more for destruction than good -

not only that, they even set up establishments
to normalize their incessant bloodlust as tradition,
and punish dissenters as traitors!

Earth monkeys confuse terrorism for civilization,
exploitation for exploration, prejudice for heritage,
inequality for economy, indifference for democracy,
in fact, there are very few lifeforms in the galaxy
as cannibalistic as the monkeys of the blue rock,
despite being ridiculously capable in every respect.

Humans are like the trees of planet earth,
extremely rare in the universe, yet still wasted.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Naskar Goes to Earth: Field Notes from A Planet of Apes