Al counters:
<<Okay, I'll bite. How do you know that the moronic
minority who might have been influenced by Spillane's
over-the-top misogyny, sadism and general right wing antics,
didn't find his "brutal exercises" therapeutic?>>
I will propose Polanski's _The Pianists_ as an example of
what certain Germans found therapeutic...
<<I find it difficult to conceive of books as harmful.
Perhaps when used as missiles...>>
Of course a book can be harmful. Particularly when a person
gets inspired for it *and* knows nothing about taking
responsibility for his own actions. Propaganda works on this
principle.
I will always defend freedom of expression, included the
press, but bad ideas are much more dangerous than bad
actions. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you
look at it), it's common that bad ideas only reveal
themselves as bad when some time has gone by. Since the same
happens with good ideas, it's a bad idea to prohibit or limit
the expression of ideas, period. But that doesn't negate the
possibly devastating harm that bad ideas can have.
I propose the past two centuries as an example (of the
results of bad ideas). History is full of them. In modern
times, ideas have been contained in books more often than
not. Now they're mostly contained in the show, which includes
most books. The ideas are now images.
Best,
MrT
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