Book banning has resurfaced as a mainstream response to rising cultural fear and uncertainty. Nuclear war threats, measles outbreaks, and other apocalyptic pressures contribute to a feeling that there is no stable ground beneath people’s feet. Distrust and loss of control appear to underlie many initiatives, including efforts to restrict books. The impulse toward banning reflects a desire for control rather than a straightforward conservative agenda. A library audit at a school in progressive Toronto helped inspire the work, showing how censorship can trivialize art and weaken democratic life. The result is a new censorship consensus that reshapes public culture through fear and administrative power.
"Right now, we're under the potential threat of a nuclear war. Cases of measles are rising, and book banning has become more and more of a mainstream thing. It doesn't feel like the 2026 that we were anticipating. What is it about book banning, specifically, that this idea that we used to regard as a symbol of backward thinking has become so popular again?"
"All that seems to be in play right now. That's part of the feeling of uneasiness and uncertainty-of feeling that there really isn't a ground beneath our feet right now. And I think that sense of distrust and loss of control is maybe beneath a lot of the factors you mentioned. Certainly, with book banning, there is a kind of desire for control that I see in many of the initiatives."
"I spoke to Ira about the sense of cultural fear and helplessness that seems to be behind the resurgence of book banning and about how his book was inspired not by a conservative drive to ban books but by a so-called library audit at a school in the heart of progressive Toronto."
Read at The Walrus
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