ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, October 1, 1996 TAG: 9610010042
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: Associated Press
PEOPLE FOR THE AMERICAN WAY included the Bedford incident on its 307-page report on ``Attacks on the Freedom To Learn.''
A highly-publicized Bedford County incident in which a teacher confiscated a student's book by radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh was among 16 alleged censorship incidents in Virginia cited by People for the American Way.
Nationally, the Washington-based organization that tracks what it contends are efforts to restrict free expression listed 475 such instances in schools during the past academic year.
One-third of the challenges were led by religious conservative groups such as the Christian Coalition, said People for the American Way's 307-page report, ``Attacks on the Freedom To Learn.''
The case in Bedford County involved a fourth-grader who was reading Limbaugh's ``The Way Things Ought to Be'' during a free study time. The teacher took the book after noticing a chapter titled ``Condoms: The New Diploma.'' The teacher said the subject was not appropriate for a 9-year-old.
Limbaugh called the incident a ``liberal'' attack against him. The boy's father, who gave his son permission to read the book, sued Bedford County school officials.
A trial date has not been set, but a federal judge in June refused to lift the school system's ban on the book and said it was above the pupil's reading level.
Other Virginia incidents cited by People for the American Way:
* ``Where the Sidewalk Ends,'' a book by Shel Silverstein, was removed from an elementary school library in Chester for selections that allegedly could be considered racist and biased. A parent objected to the book, but it was retained.
* In Prince William County, a minister objected to profanity and violence in John Steinbeck's ``Of Mice and Men.'' The book, used in ninth- and 10th-grade English classes, was retained.
* In Fairfax County, the School Board rejected a proposal to include classroom displays of contraceptives in Family Life Education classes.
* In Arlington, a middle-school librarian was told to cancel a subscription to a skateboarding magazine, Thrasher, because it contained inappropriate language.
Carole Shields, president of People for the American Way, said the would-be censors have ``political or ideological agendas'' to promote. ``And it shows that the largest organized effort to limit what's taught in the schools is coming from the religious right,'' she said.
But Monica Hildebrandt, a spokeswoman for the Chesapeake-based Christian Coalition, said the report is inaccurate.
``We have never encouraged parents to ask their school boards to take certain books out of school systems,'' Hildebrandt said. ``We have suggested to concerned parents that a PG [parental guidance] shelf be made possible in a school library where it would take a signature from a parent for a kid to have that particular book.''
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