Since it was founded in 1982, Banned Books Week has highlighted the value of free and open access to information by drawing attention to the attempts to remove books and other materials from libraries, schools, and bookstores.
No, we're not banning books at Viterbo Library. Banned Book Week is an annual celebration that draws attention to challenges to books and books that have been banned in schools as well as libraries. We WANT you to read these books! Books are often banned for supposed moral or religious reasons, or sometimes just because a single person disagrees with a character or story. But Librarians believe in your freedom to read whatever you choose.
To the right you will find the Top Ten challenged books from the past year, 2020. Many of these books have been in the top ten for several or many years. 2020 saw an increase in challenges to books about racism and racial justice.
Below you can also find other books in the Viterbo Library that have been banned or challenged at some point in time.
Go forth and READ BANNED BOOKS!
Banned for: being a picture book with a black character, author, a white man, did not have the right to create a Black character and that he only created a "Black" story so that he could get the award
Banned for: being 'depraved, immoral, psychotic, vulgar, and anti-Christian' and obscenity
Banned for: references to nudity, religion and witchcraft and being 'weird and frightening'
Banned for: ' for depicting magic, witches, and witchcraft in a positive light'
Banned for: a sex scene that was "a bit much" and "inappropriate language."
Banned for: "religious viewpoint,” “unsuited to age group” and “violence.
Banned for: "desensitizing children to nudity"
Banned for: “profanity,” “morbid and depressing themes,” and the author’s alleged “anti-business attitude.” Others have called it “derogatory towards African Americans, women, and the developmentally disabled.”
Banned for : "not appropriate for any child whose parents support traditional family values," and being a "tool of indoctrination to normalize transgender behavior"
Banned for: Author was mixed up with another author who wrote a book about Marxism.
Banned for: promoting witchcraft, including sexual content, offensive language, and being "a masterpiece of satanic deception"
Banned for : "references to witchcraft and atheism and a lot of swearing"
Banned for: Insensitivity, offensive language, racism, sexually explicit, and drug use.
Banned for: racial themes, sexual content, and passages about ghosts
Banned for: Homosexuality, religious viewpoint, unsuited to age group
Banned for: including LGBT characters, drug use, and profanity, and being considered sexually explicit with mature themes.
Banned for: violence, racism and political viewpoint.
Banned for: themes of rape and use of profanity and racial slurs.
Banned for: depictions of homosexuality, offensive language, religious viewpoints, sexually explicit, violence, unsuited to age group.
Banned for: being "anti-family"
Banned for: frank descriptions of masturbation, sex, drugs, and suicide.
Banned for: promoting atheism and attacking Christianity, in particular the Catholic church.
Banned for: inappropriate language, pervasive vulgarity and racially-insensitive language, indoctrination of distrust of police.
Banned for: Anti-ethnic, anti-family, insensitivity, offensive language, occult/satanic, violence, religious viewpoint, and sexuality.
Banned for:"adult" language, frequent sexual references, and violence.
Banned for: inappropriate for age group, believing Anne Frank wasn't a real person, discussion of sex and masturbation, being pro-Jewish propaganda, etc.
Banned for: being sexist.
Banned for: expressing expletives and alluding to masturbation and other sexual fantasies as well as diminishing, in the eyes of children, the statures of certain authority figures.
Banned for: sexually explicit material, graphic descriptions, disturbing language, an underlying socialist-communist agenda and being a “bad book.”
Banned for: profanity and sexual references, use of vulgar and obscene language, as well as statements defamatory to God, being anti-white, immoral, and/or violent
Banned for: drug and alcohol use, sexual content, suicide, and being unsuited for age group.
Banned for: discussion of alcohol, poverty, bullying, violence, sexuality, profanity and slurs related to homosexuality and mental disability.
