Prohibition

I watched Footloose yesterday. Yes, it does have something to do with children's literature. Or maybe it is just literature in general. In the movie, they talk a lot about prohibition, and one recurring theme is the idea of censorship. Some people of the town wanted to rid the libraries of certain books that they deemed unholy and unfit for children's reading. How terrible is that! There was even one scene where they had a book burning rally and destroyed many of the stories. However, the minister of the church in the town finally came to realize that prohibition and censorship was not the answer. What people needed was not an avoidance of temptation, but a complete change of heart that made that temptation undesirable, or at least recognizable. In other words, with the right heart, someone can read a book and know the wrong things that happen in the story, understand why they are wrong, and realize that they will have to encounter sin and wrong-doing in their everyday lives. With a change of heart, people can turn dancing into something that is holy and joyful, and not sinful. Fairytales can be fun and entertaining, and not have an anti-feminism agenda.