Finally. The Bible is banned. In Utah.

[SerendipityJane]

This is what happens when you let the permanently dim write laws. They forget how to protect the status quo.

I also suspect - like many so called "Christians" - they haven't actually read the bible. Not being particularly Christian myself (that's irony, by the way) I don't know if part of being a Christian is knowing what the bible actually says or not ?

I mean if you can't tell me what Kings 3:15, or Romans 7:1-4 say, then are you a Christian ? How about John 3:16 ?

(Yes, I deliberately used a hyperbolic title. This is the UK in 2023. It's how we do things. If we wanted carefully nuanced news and sober analysis without a tinge of hysteria we wouldn't be here now, would we ?)

The move follows a complaint from a parent that the King James Bible has material unsuitable for children.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-65794363

I would find this amusing to happen in Florida. Books can be banned and teachers sacked for just 1 complaint.

Florida Atheist Uses State's New Book-Banning Law To Object To The Bible | HuffPost UK Politics (huffingtonpost.co.uk)

"Is this the message we want to teach our children? If you rape a woman, the father has to give you 50 silver pieces?” he asked in one of the letters cited by Patch Miami.
“As the Bible casually references (i.e. Matthew 15:19) such topics as murder, adultery, sexual immorality and fornication ... do we really want to teach our youth about drunken orgies?” he added."

If you write laws, you have to apply them equally.

If you write laws, you have to apply them equally.

What a strange notion. It'll never catch on.

If someone said they had a book full of "bestiality, incest, rape" and asked if they could put it in primary schools, I bet the reaction would be a hard no.

Then tell them it was the Bible and see the reaction

Utah district removes Bible from elementary, middle schools - Los Angeles Times (latimes.com)

Parents, as well as students, guardians, district employees and board members can challenge books, Williams said. The Salt Lake Tribune obtained a copy of the request in which the unknown parent wrote that the Bible contains topics of “incest, onanism, bestiality, prostitution, genital mutilation, fellatio, dildos, rape, and even infanticide.”
“You’ll no doubt find that the Bible, under Utah Code Ann. § 76-10-1227, has ‘no serious values for minors’ because it’s pornographic by our new definition,” the parent wrote, referring to the state law.
The nonprofit Freedom From Religion Foundation supported the parent, despite the group’s overall opposition to banning books.
“This is one of these cases where the book banners have to be careful what they wish for because they can’t have their cake and eat it too,” foundation co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor said. “They can’t ban X-rated material and not include the Bible.”

It's the Book of Mormon next

After Bible, Book of Mormon now challenged in Davis School District (fox13now.com)

And then a Principal fired for forgetting to tell parents that her pupils would be seeing a picture of Michelangelo's David

Michelangelo's 'David' sparks debate about parental rights in Florida : NPR

I bet the same people trying to ban books like Maus will be up in arms about this.

Hilariousl. Maybe it'll teach them a lesson. Or motivate them to get literacy classes so they can actually read the book they purportedly follow. Then perhaps like most folk who've actually done so, they might reconsider following it!

Utah is really weird...

Obviously Mormons are very traditional, also they highly value education, good neighbourliness, kindness, civic duty. BYU has huge support so lots of highly educated ppl moved to Utah for good civic society, low crime rates, nice neighbours, good family work life balance, amazing scenery, good tech jobs. These migrants can be quite lefty. Salt Lake City itself would have democratic representatives in Congress but for jerrymandering.

Banned in primary schools. Not elsewhere.

Well, the first white people to land in North America were the Puritans so it stands to reason that bullshit would carry on down the line....

It's scary what's going on in America.....

Then perhaps like most folk who've actually done so, they might reconsider following it!

Like me!

It dawned on me when I was reading the bible to my then 3/4 year olds or listening to audio bible in the background with them. I had to do a lot of skipping and changing scriptures because what I was hearing/reading sounded either inappropriate or scary or wrong for them to hear.

I began to question if the bible was actually appropriate for children, then I began to question the bible, then I began to question...

... And now, long story short, I'm no longer a Christian (but not an atheist either) and my kids don't believe in or read the bible either, though they're free to do so and have always been free to believe what they want.

Well, the first white people to land in North America were the Puritans so it stands to reason that bullshit would carry on down the line.

The first, as far as we know, were the Vikings. Their concept of religion was also pretty fucked up.

But off topic but I went to a church primary school and my friend and I went through the Bible finding all the references we could to sex. She also tried to convince me that men had periods too because of the reference to male ‘emissions’ in Leviticus. Wasn’t the most helpful form of sex education.

@Jesusfolower all the 'liberal bastards' want is equal treatment under the law. A good idea would be to not have book bans at all - wouldn't you agree?

Interesting change of view from a Republican

"Ken Ivory, a Republican legislator in the state, released a statement on Thursday reversing his position on the ban, after initially calling the complaint a "mockery." He wrote that the Bible is a "challenging read" for children, and that the Bible is "best taught, and best understood, in the home, and around the hearth, as a family."

A Utah school district has removed the Bible from middle and elementary schools : NPR