Torquemada in the US*

In what is theoretically the most advanced country in the world, censorship is emptying libraries and it is easier to buy a gun than it is to freely read a book.

A burgeoning and alarming pandemic is getting little media coverage in the United States. PEN America, a century-old institution devoted to protecting freedom of expression, has just reported that books are currently “under profound attack in the United States.” In 2022 alone, there were calls to censor more than 2,500 titles (twice as many as the previous year), placing the focus, as expected, on LGBTQ-themed titles and essays or novels denouncing racial, sexual or social discrimination. At the helm of this new crusade is the state of Florida, led by ultra-conservative Gov. Ron DeSantis. Areas like Duval County have become famous because users are uploading videos where, after thorough censorship, library shelves appear to be literally empty.

In order to perpetrate this stunning dystopic frenzy, people estimate that more than 2 million titles have been quarantined, even though we are talking about a small county in a single state. Indeed, the virus of censorship is not limited to Florida. Six more states — including some as important as Utah, Oklahoma and Tennessee — have already passed laws to “limit” materials in public libraries.

Several days ago, in a horrific article in The New York Times, Patricia McCormick, author of “Sold” (one of the most censored books in the whole country during the first quarter of 2023), reported that her book is being removed in bulk due to a passage that describes (soberly and without being crude) the sexual assault of a 13-year-old girl by an older man. The short passage is considered “pornography,” a classic excuse to enact a book ban.

McCormick is only one of thousands of writers who are victims of this puritanical, extreme and fascistic wave that has become, in states such as Florida, a fantastic election trump card for politicians such as DeSantis, politicians who not only don’t hide that shameful behavior, but who tout censorship as proof of a “new morality.” The most striking thing is that this is happening in a country that boasts — or used to boast — that it is the most advanced democracy in the world, a country where its leaders have the gall to preach to other nations about how to function. The United States is scandalized, for example, by the absence of human rights in Tehran or Kabul, and yet they are incapable of stopping a bunch of Torquemadas from clearing out their own libraries.

As reported by PEN itself, what began as a strategy on the part of a few visionary politicians — followers of the fanatic Donald Trump — has permeated a very significant portion of American society. There is growing complicity between censors and parents’ associations, and even some teachers and librarians. As if we were still in the Middle Ages, in the alleged cradle of Western civilization, books remain public enemy No. 1. We have reached a point where in some states, it is easier to buy a gun than it is to read a book freely in a library. McCormick ends her article by saying something that is more important than ever in America: “Books are not the problem. They are part of the solution.” It is almost embarrassing that someone has to issue such a reminder in the most influential newspaper in the theoretically most important country in the world.

*Editor’s Note: This article is available in its original language with a paid subscription.