The public library used to be a place where reference books and other material was stored . You might find obscure ideas there as well as opinion and directions on ideas one wouldn't necessarily have in you own home . Here in Maryland I was fortunate to be able to check out vinyl records from my library by the late fifties . The jazz and classical sides that I wasn't spending money on unless I thought I just had to have a copy were another luxury item taken for granted especially by me , a denizen of the library. Today my public library has "Pop" Cds , videos,as well as expensive comic books .While they still have reference books , in fact a reference section , they tend to become more and more generic instead of introspective into the diverse subjects of the world .I have spoken with the buyers for the systems of two local counties and the reasoning behind this trend and the general answer is that "Circulation" brings more funds to buy and support the library system . The quick circulation of popular music CDs brings attention to the entire system even though the circulation drops off and dies as that CD loses popularity to another "Pop" side . This ,unfortunately, has gone the same way with printed matter .
In the early eighties I bumped into a book by an obscure archaeologist , Barbara Thiering , called "The Qumran Origins of the early Christian Church" . After reading her book and having it out for the limit , I went to a drug store and copied it page for page because I was so impressed and books published in Australia weren't found on the shelves of the mall unless it involved Olivia Newton John . I tried to get more books by "Thiering" as years went by and she produced more and they were available for a while through the library system . It wasn't long before her books became "Reference" material and then I had to send away to specific library systems available across the United States . Her books ,ironically, could still be found in seminaries and Christian Colleges ,for instance "Oral Roberts University " had copies for a while but eventually they became totally unavailable through the system .
I knew that Barbara Thiering now had a London publisher and had ,what might seem , a greater world wide accessible product . In today's world of "Amazon" and the Internet , in fact , her books are buy-able but not available to kids coming into the library anymore . I have joked about it being in the "Book Burning" section but I am afraid that joke is very close to where it actually is hidden . I have been fortunate to have found Barbara Thiering online and have had some correspondence with her and have been flippant enough to suggest that if she published a book as fiction , she might get better response . I also suggested this wise crack to another brilliant writer I met here in Cyberspace , Ahmed Osman , whose books "Stranger in the Valley of the Kings" and "Moses , Pharaoh of Egypt" also used to be on the local library shelves .
The fact is that we really aren't too far away from "Book Burning" as a human race . When John Lennon remarked that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus the response to some people was to have a Beatles record burning . In recent years controversy about Samuel Clemens has come to fore in the attempt of changing the language of an era , our history found between the lines in fiction like "Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn". It is ironic that Clemens might be controversial today for the use of the word "Nigger"when , at the time, it might have been controversial in the suggestion that all men in America should be and free .I don't think that Clemens will achieve "Book Burning" status (except in a few towns). I now appears that the "Taliban" are coming back to power and in fact the United States is willing to bargain with them right now .The Taliban are supposedly the lesser of the two evils in Afghanistan . "Taliban" over "Al Caeda" and Bin Laden in spite of their history of the abuse of women in the name and guise of Allah . It's almost as if we forgot about the football fields of Afghanistan where women were shot in the back of the head for not wearing a "Burka". It is unbelievable .
Diplomacy might cover a multitude of sins yet we , as a democratic people , still are looking back at Roe Vs. Wade and are willing to debate an idea like the right of a woman to abort an unwanted child . This right to life or right of choice would seem without question except for the fact that we also seem to equivocate around the "Scopes" trial and "Darwinism". Religious mythology versus science takes too much attention in a government that was supposedly designed to separate religion from government because of what the founding founders learned from their own closer history with the "Church of England". Can we not remember anything ?
It was last year that the question arose in this country about weather "Torture" should be used on prisoners . I thought that the "Spanish Inquisition" had proven than people will confess or say anything to get out of torture . People said that they could fly and implicated their neighbors to be killed instead of them . It is incredible that we can go backward and forget so easily . "Book burning" is a lot gentler than "People burning" so you might say ,"Don't complain!" That is don't complain till they start burning you .
I miss the library of old though not too long ago . America once was a country that was open to ideas and theories beyond the conservative line . The word "Liberal" has become a dirty word in popular radio . The demonetization of the media as "The Liberal Press" is meant to discredit politically and is an opinion and is obviously not a reality in every case ,for instance "Fox News" or the stations that support Rush Limbaugh and his broadcast. The free press is missing in the library , at least the pressing ideas and theories that are contrary to the religious mythology that is prevalent in this country . I wish I could believe that this is a place of religious freedom but I am afraid that when you scratch the surface of America you come out with a "Theocracy" founded in Judaism . It is ironic to me that Judaism might be founded in a Theocracy that was invented in Egypt by a Pharaoh who attempted to dictate monotheism to a country that all ready had freedom of religion . "Thou Shalt Have No Other God Before ME" , the first commandment of Akhnaton , the self professed son of Aten , whom you can only access through him , certainly seems familiar somehow . I wish I could find out more about him but a lot of the theories are in the "Book Burning" section and no longer available because Brittany Spears has a new CD out this month and the funding has been cut in favor of circulation .
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