Why is it bad to burn or destroy books?

Answer 1

Book burnings have been used for centuries to destroy material that the "rulers" or "leaders" of the time do not what the general population to read. As has been pointed out books were burned in Nazi Germany, and at other points throughout time. These days there is also the more mild form of banning books - where certain books are banned from library and bookshop shelves so that people can not read them or buy them.

Putting aside the fact that people should have the right to freedom of speech as long as it does no harm - by destroying books you are also destroying a persons ability to find their own truth and to make up their own minds. The Christian church is a strong proponent of banning books, and they are usually books that are harmless and make no impact upon a persons faith. Harry Potter has been heavily hit by book banning (mainly on Christian grounds as it has witches and magic), The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman has also been banned (because of the veiled hint of the Catholic Church) - and yet The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe has not been banned even though it has the White Witch - a sign of bias as the Narnia books are essentially a Christian text with Aslan being Jesus (don't believe me then read the book with that thought in mind).

Overall banning books or burning books is a bad practice because it reduces the ability of people to think for themselves, and it reduces their ability to make informed consent about what they will and will not believe. If you remove all the books about Darwin and the theory of evolution and instead have only books about intelligent design - then intelligent design is what people will believe.

By destroying books, "leaders' are removing free will and encouraging the propagation of their own ideas - which leads to everyone in the community having a much narrower viewpoint. While I do believe that certain books should not be given to children until they are old enough emotionally to cope with the content - people should be encouraged to read more widely so that they learn more about their world and the people in it. If everyone were the same it would be boring, and you don't learn anything new by restricting what people have access to.

Answer 2

Because it symbolizes the destruction of the content of the books. When people burned Beatles albums in the 60s it wasn't because they hated records, it was because they were angry with the Beatles' words. To burn books or music is ironic because to burn them is exercising freedom of speech, but the act of burning them is censoring the artist/author, a violation of their freedom of speech. All in all, I think it's bad to burn or destroy books because everyone should be able to look past their misunderstanding or anger at a message and respect the author for saying anything. It's so hard to put human emotion into words, why should anyone destroy what some people will never be able to accomplish?

Answer 3

Well, it's pretty much a waste of money. But book burning usually has to do with a group (country, political party, etc) deciding that a book is bad and that NOBODY should read it, so they try to burn as many as they can.
It's pretty much a restriction on other people's choices, since the book burners are deciding what others can and cannot read.

Answer 4

Books are the bodies of ideas, in a very real sense. They are the most concrete and reliable way of exchanging information, in addition to being the most permanent (barring chiseling in stone). To burn a book is to burn an idea, and that is a thing so heinous it makes me break out in a cold sweat. No matter how strange, dangerous, or twisted an idea may be, it still deserves life.

Answer 5

books are seen by many as symbols for learning, and the opposite of ignorance. it is not necessarily the literal destruction of the books that bothers people (altho in cases where rare volumes are destroyed that can be very distressing and a lot of people do take special care with actual books), but it is more an outrage towards the type of people or the type of regime that would condone destroying books and all that it implies (ie. lack of appreciation or concern for higher learning, support of ignorance and censorship).

Answer 6

Air pollution.
Seriously, our First Amendment right allows us to say (and write) what we want without persecution. It doesn't say we MUST read a book if we find it objectionable but we have the right to if we so choose. Rather than burning a book, wouldn't it be better to donate it to a library?

Answer 7

those who burn books end up burning people......