Why Tyrants Hate Books

This is a repost of an excellent and relevant article written by Rakhi Bose for Outlook Magazine on September 21, 2022:

“Banned Book Week: Why Tyrants Hate Books”

In a world divided between existential needs and metaphysical conundrums, books are the temporal doors to realms of knowledge, fantasy, spirituality and freedom.

“The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.” ― Oscar Wilde

Books are the currency of thoughts and ideas. In a world divided between existential needs and metaphysical conundrums, books are temporal doors to the realms of spirituality, knowledge, fantasy, and freedom. Perhaps that is why tyrants have always hated books. Hated or feared? Perhaps a bit of both. 

Soon after the first books started getting printed with the coming of Johannes Gutenburg's revolutionary printing press in Germany, those in power came up with ways to cap the spread of ideas. Sometime in the mid-16th century, the Roman Catholic Church, once one of the most powerful institutions in the West, launched the Index Librorum Prohibitorum or the "List of Prohibited Books". It was a list of publications deemed heretical or contrary to Catholics morality. Reading or owning such books could lead to (and did to) harsh punishments for heresy. 

Many works by some of the greatest European thinkers, scientists, philosophers, poets were banned by the Church, and remained hidden for centuries in the papal library of forbidden books. 

But tyrants were banning books even before it was conceived. Before the printing press, the written word was a novelty only the rich or religious could afford. Sometime in 600 BC, the Hebrew prophet Jeremiah of Anathoth wrote on a scroll that the King of Babylon would destroy the land of Judah. The tail, recounted in Jeremiah 36, ends with the King of Judah burning the scroll and having Jeremiah arrested. 

Book burning, the precursor of bans, essentially did the same thing and has been a political exercise across the world. Be it the Catholics or the Communists, the kings or the fascists, the capitalists and the Nazis. Joseph Stalin, an erstwhile bibliophile, was notorious for purging the libraries in USSR of books he found to even have a tinge of liberal Western ideology. As were Adolf Hitler and his Nazis.

When the Mamluks from Turkey invaded India in the 12th century, one of the first things they attacked was Nalanda University, the crown jewel of the Magadha empire (in present day Bihar) which was said to have housed about 9 million books. Book burning was a strategy in the Ottoman empire too in Turkey where conquerors were in the habit of burning books that were written or read in the reign of the previous ruler. It was not a matter of ideology as much as plain politics.

In today's digital world and age of pirated literature and "copies of copies of copies", burning books could best be a symbolic power move. But while the Vatican chose to stop keeping its inventory of banned books in 1966, governments across the world continue to keep tabs. An analysis by PEN America, for instance, has found that nearly school books were banned 2,500 times in 2021 across the US, half of them in states like Florida. The report noted that a majority of books that faced the axe featured content or characters or themes related to LGBTQIA, persons of colour, or other so-called "contentious" themes. A famously "banned" book also led to an attack on writer Salman Rushdie who barely survived the hate.

Banning of books represents a larger malaise, an attack on knowledge, on ideas, on the freedom of the mind to think, create or question. Here, the historical burning of the Library of Alexandria may hold a lesson.

The philosopher-scientist Carl Sagan at the beginning of his magnum opus Cosmos laments the loss of the famous library - a pinnacle of the classical Roman civilisation, stating that “all the knowledge in the ancient world was within those marble walls". In an editorial for Time magazine, Richard Ovenden, author of Burning the Books: A History of the Deliberate Destruction of Knowledge, points out that that tale of the burning of the library of Alexandria in what is today's Egypt was a legend - a conglomeration of myths. He purported that rather than resulting from the destruction of war or a single fire, the library (or libraries) of Alexandria went obsolete due to neglect of the state and the intellectual degeneracy of readers who became increasingly drawn to ignorance. The burning of the libraries really represented the corrosion of the great empire built by the Romans from within.

Today, when libraries are fast becoming relics, Alexandria holds an important lesson. Banning books can limit access to knowledge but ignorance is the tyrants' real goal. But the reader must also strive to stay wide awake against the enticing slumber of ignorance. As a mark of this mental resistance, September 18-24 is celebrated as 'Banned Books Week", an annual awareness campaign that seeks to shed light on books that have been banned or challenged by governments or sections of the people across the world. 

After all, in the words of Maximillien Robespierre, the hero of the French Revolution, “The secret of freedom lies in educating people, whereas the secret of tyranny is in keeping them ignorant.”

— Written by Rakhi Bose

The Power of Nonviolence

“Peace requires something far more difficult than revenge or merely turning the other cheek; it requires empathizing with the fears and unmet needs that provide the impetus for people to attack each other. Being aware of these feelings and needs, people lose their desire to attack back because they can see the human ignorance leading to these attacks; instead, their goal becomes providing the empathic connection and education that will enable them to transcend their violence and engage in cooperative relationships.”

― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Speak Peace in a World of Conflict: What You Say Next Will Change Your World

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“Nonviolence is only for the brave men and women of the world because it requires courage – courage to love the beauty of life, beauty of humanity and the beauty of the world…The more we practice nonviolence in our words, thoughts and actions the more peaceful will be our inner state. . . The objective of nonviolence is to create a beloved world community.” ― Amit Ray

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“Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon. It is a weapon unique in history, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. It is a sword that heals. [Nonviolence] is directed against forces of evil rather than against persons who happen to be doing the evil. It is evil that the nonviolent resister seeks to defeat, not the persons victimized by evil. . . The non-violent resistor not only avoids external, physical violence, but he avoids internal violence of spirit. He not only refuses to shoot his opponent, but he refuses to hate him. And he stands with understanding, goodwill at all times.” ― Martin Luther King Jr.

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“A fourth point that must be brought out concerning nonviolent resistance is that it avoids not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. At the center of nonviolence stands the principle of love. In struggling for human dignity, the oppressed people of the world must not allow themselves to become bitter or indulge in hate campaigns. To retaliate with hate and bitterness would do nothing but intensify the hate in the world. Along the way of life, someone must have sense enough and morality enough to cut off the chain of hate. This can be done only by projecting the ethics of love to the center of our lives.”

― Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

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“Peace is present right here and now, in ourselves and in everything we do and see. Every breath we take, every step we take, can be filled with peace, joy, and serenity. The question is whether or not we are in touch with it. We need only to be awake, alive in the present moment.” ― Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life

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Why Authoritarians Attack the Arts

This blog post contains excerpts from an opinion piece written for the New York Times in 2017 by Eve L. Ewing. It offers an important historical perspective on the role of the arts in counteracting the propaganda of authoritarian regimes. Around the world, artists have been persecuted, imprisoned, and exiled for daring to speak truth to power. We must ask ourselves why authoritarians fear the arts so much. The answer speaks to the profound responsibility artists have to remain courageous and brave in the face of intimidation and threats.

“But as Hitler understood, artists play a distinctive role in challenging authoritarianism. Art creates pathways for subversion, for political understanding and solidarity among coalition builders. Art teaches us that lives other than our own have value. Like the proverbial court jester who can openly mock the king in his own court, artists who occupy marginalized social positions can use their art to challenge structures of power in ways that would otherwise be dangerous or impossible.

Authoritarian leaders throughout history have intuited this fact and have acted accordingly. The Stalinist government of the 1930s required art to meet strict criteria of style and content to ensure that it exclusively served the purposes of state leadership. In his memoir, the composer and pianist Dmitri Shostakovich writes that the Stalinist government systematically executed all of the Soviet Union’s Ukrainian folk poets. When Augusto Pinochet took power in Chile in 1973, muralists were arrested, tortured and exiled. Soon after the coup, the singer and theater artist Victor Jara was killed, his body riddled with bullets and displayed publicly as a warning to others. In her book “Brazilian Art Under Dictatorship,” Claudia Calirman writes that the museum director Niomar Moniz Sodré Bittencourt had to hide works of art and advise artists to leave Brazil after authorities entered her museum, blocked the exhibition and demanded the work be dismantled because it contained dangerous images like a photograph of a member of the military falling off a motorcycle, which was seen as embarrassing to the police…

“American observers shook their heads in disapproval when the performance artist Danilo Maldonado was arrested and jailed for criticizing the Castro regime, and when the Chinese sculptor and photographer Ai Weiwei was placed under house arrest and had his studio demolished by the government. But closer to home, it is imperative that we understand what Trump’s attack on the arts is really about. It’s not about making America a drab and miserable place, nor is it about a belief in austerity or denying resources to communities in need. Much like the disappearance of data from government websites and the exclusion of critical reporters from White House briefings, this move signals something broader and more threatening than the inability of one group of people to do their work. It’s about control. It’s about creating a society where propaganda reigns and dissent is silenced.

“We need the arts because they make us full human beings. But we also need the arts as a protective factor against authoritarianism. In saving the arts, we save ourselves from a society where creative production is permissible only insofar as it serves the instruments of power. When the canary in the coal mine goes silent, we should be very afraid — not only because its song was so beautiful, but also because it was the only sign that we still had a chance to see daylight again.” — Eve L. Ewing

Preamble to a Code of Ethics: Artists

This document is a preamble to a code of ethics for a cosmopolitan art collective. We offer an invitation to the global creative community to embrace a collective discourse of universal morality based on the principles of nonviolence while seeking proactive pursuits that stand against injustice and promote cultural diversity, intellectualism, and higher consciousness thought. Like Freire, we conceptualize a dialogue of critical thinking “which discerns an indivisible solidarity between the world and the people and admits of no dichotomy between them” (Freire 2017, 92). We envision the global community as Marcus Aurelius does, “the world as a living being – one nature, one soul (Aurelius 2003, 46). This cosmopolitan collective of artists seeks to draw forth courage, virtue, and solidarity within the human race as we face increasing tides of anti-intellectualism, bigotry, violence, and authoritarianism. Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel states: “There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest” (Wiesel 1986). How then shall we protest? Protest takes many forms, from public demonstrations against state-sponsored violence to the quiet inner fortitude and commitment to never subdue one’s moral disposition in the face of ostentatious and egregious instances of extreme cruelty and inhumanity. We shall never become desensitized to violence.

Thoreau’s embrace of civil disobedience invites a foundational ethical code of peaceful resistance yet invokes a courageous moral stand in the face of aggression and social injustice. The Dalai Lama calls upon us to understand that “an attitude of calmness and nonviolence is actually an indication of strength, as it shows the confidence that comes from having truth and justice on one’s side” (Dalai Lama 2012, 58). To strengthen and solidify this collective of global artists, we must endeavor to create our own code of ethics based upon the ethos of peace, nonviolence, and compassion for humanity, so we may uphold each other to a higher standard of moral consciousness amidst the rising tide of dehumanization, persecution, and the subversion of the human spirit.

What Are Ethics?

The Stoics regard ethics as the fundamental determination of an individual’s virtue; courage, moderation, wisdom, and justice embody the core principles of an enlightened being. Life is not a game to be played for selfish pursuit, but a journey to embark on to discover higher, universal truths. The Kantian philosophy of ethics and morality resides in a ‘categorical imperative’, “a universal ethical principle stating that one should always respect humanity in others, and that one should only act in accordance with rules that could hold true for everyone” (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy n.d). Kant adopts a cosmopolitanism theory supporting the premise that all rational individuals are citizens of a globalized moral community that seek and deserve equality, freedom, and independent personhood. World peace can be achieved when members of society and the international community alike follow the ethics of free determination based upon a universal moral law of nonviolence.

Philosophers note two essential theories of ethics. Consequentialist theory attests that the desired outcome benefits the greatest good for the majority, while deontological theories believe that an obligation to higher moral principles should drive our ethical decision-making. “Therefore, if the action that would ensure the greatest good violates a duty or moral principle, we should not undertake such an action” (Kirnan 2018, 16). A resolution of these conflicting theories naturally lies in circumstance, underscoring the need for a fundamental code of ethics for our artistic community, so we may guide each other with integrity, honesty, love, and a commitment to uphold our foundational principles.

How do We Address Ethical Challenges?

A code of ethics implementing a model of restorative justice provides a nonadversarial mechanism for accountability, reconciliation, repair, and healing within the collective should issues of ethical or moral concern arise. As we undertake this globalized artistic initiative, our empirical duty is to address ethical challenges with maturity, rationality, intelligence, compassion, and wisdom. Cosmopolitanism is founded on the moral ideals of peace, security, freedom, self-determination, and individual well-being, within the collective and the globalized community at large (Heater 2000). Understanding that we must uplift the perception of acceptable behavioral conduct above and beyond the status quo, we must commit as an artistic community to proactively resist violence in all forms, including bullying, bigotry, and denigration of an individual’s personhood and right to freedom of existence and safety. We must actively resist oppositional defiance with courage and bravery, understanding that darker forces in the world seek to destroy the very tenants of individual freedom. “We consider a definition of ethics that goes beyond prevention and reaction, to proactive moral behavior” (Kirnan 2018, 15). Thus, we may rely upon our code of ethics to strengthen and embolden our duty as artists to seek and create higher moral truths, reflecting the world both as it is and as it could be.  

The Importance of Intellectualism

In our contemporary world, intellectualism is often viewed as elitist, a threat to the neocolonialist patriarchal status quo of domination through coercion, suppression, and sociologically violent means. Authoritarian forces in the world, fearing the spiritual liberalism of free thinking and critical thought, seek to control access to knowledge through totalitarian methods of book banning and censorship of Critical Race Theory, LGBTQ+ studies, feminism, and other progressive forms of higher consciousness intelligence that liberates humanity from the dictates of oppressive, antiquated forces. Cosmopolitan collectives must actively resist the nefarious actors in society that seek to subjugate, eliminate, and rewrite history in dystopian, Orwellian terms. “The mode of being the new intellectual can no longer consist in eloquence. . . but in active participation in practical life, as constructor, organizer, ‘permanent persuader’ and not just a simple orator” (Gramsci 2005, 52). A code of ethics for cosmopolitans embraces intellectualism as the highest philosophical and moral pursuit. One can only be a citizen of the world if one embarks on the academic pursuit to learn about the world with devoted and passionate effort.  

A Code of Ethics for Artists

As artists and citizens of the global community, we must first holistically examine ourselves before coming together as a collective unit. We must identify our proclivity towards clinging to existing habits and thought processes formed in pre-established modes of interaction and seek to improve ourselves from the core of our being. We must also examine our unconscious biases and personal triggers, so we do not bring negative elements into the collective art space. A code of ethics creates a foundational conversation from which we can move forth together in transformation and evolution. Core values such as honesty, respect, trust, empathy, and communicative listening can provide the space and psychological safety where we can learn from each other and grow as artists and individuals. Sexism, racism, violence, and discrimination of any form within the collective must be addressed and healed from within the community based on a model of restorative justice. “The morality of the artist is before else, the morality of a person” (Berleant 1977, 197). A code of ethics allows us to work together holistically so we may adopt higher universal moral and ethical standards based on the virtue of nonviolence in word and deed. From this common understanding, we can focus our energy on the tireless work of climate justice, education, anti-racism, anti-bigotry, and the pursuit of equality for all individuals on this beautiful planet, our only home.

Conclusion

As a collective of intellectually inspired artists, we must commit to understanding and embracing our shared humanity with each other and with the global community. While there are those that seek to divide the human race with racist and virulent ideological constructs, we understand that humanity is one species, and we are stronger and more powerful when we come together to elevate the benevolent nature of the human spirit. The primary objective in establishing our code of ethics is to create a moral platform of uprightness, first and foremost to each other. Gandhi calls upon us to be the change we wish to see in the world. From this perspective, may we offer the world a model of unity, respect, intellectualism, and collective integration that endeavors to inspire and enlighten others, so we can commence the difficult path of healing ourselves, each other, our planet, and elevate ourselves as citizens of the world.

Created by Dr. Julieanne Klein

References

Aurelius, Marcus. 2003. Meditations. Translated by Gregory Hays. New York: The Modern Library.

Berleant, Arnold. 1977. “Artists and Morality: Toward an Ethics of Art.” Leonardo (Oxford) 10, no. 3: 195–202.

Lama, Dalai. 2012. Beyond Religion: Ethics for a Whole World. New York: Mariner Books.

Freire, Paulo. 2018. Pedagogy of the Oppressed: 50th Anniversary Edition. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

Gramsci, Antonio. 2005. “The Intellectuals.” In Contemporary Sociological Thought: Themes and Theories, edited by Sean P. Hier. Canadian Scholars’ Press Inc.: Toronto.

Heater, Derek. 2000. “Does Cosmopolitan Thinking Have a Future?” Review of International Studies 26, no. 5: 179-197. https://www.jstor.org/stable/20097718.

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. n.d. “Immanuel Kant.” Accessed June 3, 2023. https://iep.utm.edu/kantview/#:~:text=Kant's%20ethics%20are%20organized%20around,that%20could%20hold%20for%20everyone.

Kirnan, Jean P. 2018. Everyday Ethics. United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis Group.

Stanford Encyclopedia of Ethics. 2019. “Cosmopolitanism.” Revised October 17, 2019. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmopolitanism/.

Wiesel, Elie. 1986. “Nobel Lecture.” The Nobel Prize. December 11, 1986. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1986/wiesel/lecture/.

“World Federalist Movement Institute for Global Policy.” Website. Accessed June 1, 2023. http://www.wfm-igp.org/.

Remembering History: Elie Wiesel

“Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”

Elie Wiesel (1928-2016) was a Holocaust survivor who went on to dedicate his life to political activism, teaching, writing, and speaking throughout the world about the Nazi genocide committed during World War II, when six million Jewish people, men, women, and children were murdered in Nazi concentration camps. The Nazis also targeted dissidents, Roma (Gypsies), the disabled, homosexuals, and anyone whose ideological or religious beliefs conflicted with their diabolical intention to create a “racially pure” state. In 1986 Elie Wiesel received the Nobel Peace Prize for his tireless humanitarian activism. His acceptance speech calls us to not remain indifferent in the face of injustice and oppression. The smallest of actions embracing a spirit of remembering and honoring history roots us in our humanity and can inspire us to speak out with courage and bravery during these troubling times. As the LGBTQ+ community is being actively persecuted, African Americans and minorities continue to be subjugated to brutal systemic racism, and many Native Americans still lack access to running water. The Nazis were notorious for book banning, book burning, and the censorship of intellectual thought. Let us be conscious and aware of this current moment in history, and not be distracted by technology, television, and social apathy. 

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“And that is why I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Wherever men or women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must – at that moment – become the center of the universe… There is so much injustice and suffering crying out for our attention: victims of hunger, of racism, and political persecution, writers and poets, prisoners in so many lands governed by the Left and by the Right.

Human rights are being violated on every continent. More people are oppressed than free. And then, too, there are the Palestinians to whose plight I am sensitive but whose methods I deplore. Violence and terrorism are not the answer. Something must be done about their suffering, and soon. . . As long as one dissident is in prison, our freedom will not be true. As long as one child is hungry, our lives will be filled with anguish and shame. What all these victims need above all is to know that they are not alone; that we are not forgetting them, that when their voices are stifled we shall lend them ours, that while their freedom depends on ours, the quality of our freedom depends on theirs.” - Elie Wiesel, Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech

The Power of an Idea

Throughout history, enlightened leaders and intellectuals such as Aristotle, Marcus Aurelius, Henry David Thoreau, Mohandas K. Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Desmond Tutu, the Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandela, and thousands more, have inspired followers to seek an ideal, a way of living in the world that does not seek to manipulate and subjugate but instead, endeavors to empower and uplift the human spirit in the spirit of community. Ultimately we are but one world, one global community, one race, living on one planet. As bigotry, racism, and anti-intellectualism continue to suppress the creative diversity of our beautiful, multicultural humanity, how should we respond? Education is the vehicle to transform and evolution of the mind. The overt and violent suppression of free and critical thinking by authoritarians shows the very power of an educated and free society. Banning books and shamelessly rewriting history are existential threats to democracy itself, and we must all awaken to the dangers of this moment. Education elevates us, allows us to recognize disinformation, and see through systemic and deliberate efforts to promote false narratives that erase the truth of human civilization. Education empowers young people with the tools to see the world with open eyes, awake, conscious, curious, filled with love and hope.    

I am a writer, an artist, and an intellectual activist. There are countless speeches and writings that represent the highest levels of human thought, more extraordinary than anything I could ever say myself. With a humble heart, I would like to use this blog to promote the words of others as well as my own thoughts. Perhaps I can create a space where individuals can learn some of the greatness that humanity has shown us. While quotes are short passages of longer writings and speeches, they can allow us to embody and imagine thought-provoking commentary on how the world could be, if we dare to elevate communicative discourse and learn from the greatest minds in human history. As stated by Abraham Lincoln, let us seek “the better angels of our nature” and endeavor to rise above the vitriol, bullying, and violent behavior that have become endemic in our societies. Let us educate ourselves and each other on the potential of the highest ideals of morality and consciousness that humanity can achieve, so we may uplift each other on the journey toward a more compassionate, fair, loving, and equitable world.

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“We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us even in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.”

― Henry David Thoreau, Walden