Andy Weir’s Best Seller ‘The Martian’ Gets a Classroom-Friendly Makeover

Re:Andy Weir’s Best Seller ‘The Martian’ Gets a Classroom-Fr... by abandonliberty on Monday February 27, 2017 @02:10PM (#13746910)

  First they came for the swears . . .

We should be very concerned about a precedent where we adapt or censor potentially objectionable content.

Next is content not in alignment with the schools ideologies or politics, for what is essential to a work?

These aren't abstract tin-foil hat concerns either: In 1982 Texas banned a geography textbook for mentioning evolution [1]. Publishers are financially incentivized to publish. These mechanisms enable those in power to control the information presented to children and students to suit their agendas (even while their own children attend private schools not subject to their decisions).

>According to Time magazine, the list of the most banned books of all time include . . . “Brave New World,” by Aldous Huxley; “1984,” by George Orwell

We should be pretty uptight about censorship.

https://ncse.com/cej/3/4/censorship-evolution-texas

https://www.webjunction.org/documents/webjunction/Censorship...

https://www.lehigh.edu/~infirst/bookcensorship.html

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Andy Weir’s Best Seller ‘The Martian’ Gets a Classroom-Fr... by mikeash on Monday February 27, 2017 @02:12PM (#13746930)

This is a standard slippery slope argument. Is there evidence that the slope is actually slippery? Do we know that removing swear words leads to ideological censorship?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Andy Weir’s Best Seller ‘The Martian’ Gets a Classroom-Fr... by plussed_reader on Monday February 27, 2017 @02:52PM (#13747320)

I think you can see it in self censoring of kids and adults in modern day conversation.

"The F word." "The N Word." "Eff that." "Effed in the A." "They want the D." "That scene was hot af."

Pick a better word, or demonstrate your lacking vocabulary. But the self-censorship makes one sound like a tool.

You'd get a better reaction saying, 'They want the orange dust-encrusted phallus.'

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Andy Weir’s Best Seller ‘The Martian’ Gets a Classroom-Fr... by abandonliberty on Monday February 27, 2017 @02:16PM (#13746990)

Sufficient evidence was presented to demonstrate a non-fallacious usage of the slippery slope argument. Simply because it's a slippery slope argument doesn't make it fallacious - though such accusations are very good at silencing.

Perhaps you can provide an example where increases in censorship do not make it easier for the types of problems listed above to occur, a place where the misuse of power is unheard of.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope#Non-fallacious_...

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Andy Weir’s Best Seller ‘The Martian’ Gets a Classroom-Fr... by mikeash on Monday February 27, 2017 @02:20PM (#13747041)

Your evidence only demonstrated the existence of the bottom of the slope.

[ Parent | on HN ]