Censorship is not a thing of the past. You might be surprised to learn that more than 11,000 books have been banned or challenged since 1982 and 348 reported in 2010. Banned Books Awareness Week (BBAW) is an annual event when we, the community of employees and customers at Half Price Books, celebrate our First Amendment rights. Alongside the American Library Association and booklovers everywhere, we celebrate our freedom to read. As part of this, posters and T-shirts are designed each year. Here’s a round-up of some of our favorites.
Support the imaginative and courageous authors of all books, including those that open our eyes to controversial topics. Exercise your First Amendment rights this week by reading a banned or challenged book. And encourage others to build libraries, not bonfires.
Put on your favorite “Banned Books” T-shirt this week and join us! If you haven’t already, be sure to check out the virtual rally happening online. Make a comment below telling us how you joined the First Amendment Rights Rally before 3 p.m. CST on Thursday, September 29 and enter to win a free HPB Banned Books tee. Winner will be randomly selected.
— Meredith
UPDATE: Congratulations to our random winner, Jackie Fender. You’ve won your very own HPB Banned Books T-Shirt. Drop us a note at besocial@hpb.com to claim your prize! This giveaway is now closed. Thanks to everyone who participated.
Cool, I like the fire extinguisher one. Ray Bradbury's one of my favorite authors!
I like the Lorax Dr. Seuss poster! That would make a fun graphic tee.
Loving these t-shirts! Torn between three favorites: ban ignorance, the red speak freely and the censorville one (leaning toward the last). Would be proud to wear either. 🙂
Banned books ftw! These shirts are awesome. Fire extinguisher, lorax, and censorville are my favorites, in that order<3
great tshirts and posters. LONG LIVE THE BANNED BOOK
Speak Freely, Write Candidly, Read Endlessly! LOVE IT. Story of my life. ha. Now a part of the facebook virtual rally-spread the bookwormness and read more. There's a phenomenal banned book club here in Tacoma. *do it.
Love them all. My fave t-shirts are: "A truly great library….." and "Speak freely…."Love the Lorax poster.
These are awesome t-shirts!!!
I love the Lorax one and the "breathing" one. I always have and always will read banned books.
Great t-shirts!
I adore the John Waters quote, "We need to make books cool again. If you go home with somebody and they don't have books, don't f**k them." It's been flying around Facebook lately and couldn't have gotten to the point more eloquently. 😉
One of each, please. (^-^)
Ray Bradbury is amazing. His writings should never be banned.
These t-shirts and posters are contributing well and giving sympathy to the authors of the banned books. To the people who are behind these- I salute you all!
I also like the one with the fire extinguisher. Better if it's printed on a shirt. 🙂