A naval disaster
A total of 381 books (that we have been told about) have been removed from the Nimitz Library at the U.S. Naval Academy in Maryland.
What happened to them? Maybe they were just thrown out with the trash. Maybe they were dumped in some damp basement to molder away. Or maybe they were burned.
It was definitely a book burning, even if no flame was lighted.
If a torpedo had been fired into the hull of a Nimitz class warship, the whole country would be upset – up in arms, as it were.
But a torpedo has been fired into the Nimitz Library. What’s been damaged, if not sunk, is the Naval Academy’s reputation as an institution of learning.
Note I didn’t say higher learning. I mean learning period.
The current administration’s attacks on learning are just beginning. But the attack on the Nimitz Library is a sign of even more despicable things to come.
I looked through the list of banned books. It was helpfully provided by the Navy itself – a bit of integrity following an act of infamy.
I noticed several I have read. Among them:
* How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
* White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity by Robert P. Jones
* Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong by James W. Loewen
* America's Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America by Jim Wallis
* I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou
* White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin DiAngelo
* The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks About Race, edited by Jesmyn Ward
I might mention more, but the database the Navy provided is not particularly user friendly, and its listings are hard to translate into plain text. You can find it for yourself by looking online for “381 books” or anything similar.
You’ll quickly notice several themes among the titles. They are mostly books about race, gender, the South, and history in general.
Somebody doesn’t want anyone thinking a thought about these subjects that is not approved by the powers-that-be.
And what does this gain us?
It gains us multiple new classes of Naval officers who don’t know much of anything about American history or how we got to where we are today in terms of race and gender relations – officers whose brains have been whitewashed with narrow-band propaganda.
Do we really want such poorly educated officers commanding our ships and defending our shores? Or should we look elsewhere for the best and the brightest?