While we might point to violent video games or sexually explicit films as potentially dangerous and corrupting influences on tender or vulnerable minds, the novel is treated as uplifting and salutary, regardless of its content: a kale smoothie for the soul. When we do talk about books being ‘dangerous’, it is usually with a knowing nod and a wink: and the implication is that those of us in the know know better. In a recent Guardian interview, the controversial British writer Melvin Burgess insists that ‘like most “dangerous” books, [Junk, his novel for young adults] is in fact a threat only to people who are themselves dangerous – people who want to control others’. Any suggestion that a book might be dangerous is, in other words, only ever a manifestation of bigotry or fear. —Aeon: Dark Books
Books Wield a Dangerous Power
Journalists should not amplify the ableist biases of untrained sources
Texty Cloak of Darkness in Prose
Portofess
My dad predicted Trump in 1985 – it's not Orwell, he warned, it's Brave New World
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You Are Not a Digital Native: Privacy in the Age of the Internet