Q: Do you think there is such a thing as an evil book? Wouldn't society be better off is some books were just plain not allowed to be printed?

Hoy. Well, I guess you could say that some books are “evil” – that is, evil in their intent. Myself, I think books encouraging people to be superstitious, books urging people to not think, could be considered “evil” ̵ most religious tracts, for example. But I don't see how “society” would be “better off” by banning such tomes. The best thing you can do to superstitious ignorance is to shine the light on it.

Q: But what about books which openly incite violence, books encouraging people to break laws, and even giving detailed instructions on exactly how to do it?

Hoy. Sometimes violence needs to be incited. Most laws are stupid and deserve to be broken. Besides, how could police officers be trained, without knowledge of how laws are broken? People who call for censorship never call for the government to be censored. But what is “the government” but a bunch of people? Cops who have a detailed knowledge of criminal techniques might not always be cops. How can you erase information from their brains when they revert to being civilians?

The mass media like to play up the fact that Timothy McVeigh was associated with “militia groups” (although he did not belong to a single such group). What they are less fond of telling us is that McVeigh was trained in the use of explosives by the United States military. One of the most violent publications I have ever seen is US Army Field Manual 21-150 (Combatives) – an illustrated bible of ways of killing people. It is used to train infantry soldiers. How many ex-infantrymen are walking around right now who have read, and practiced the techniques of, that book? Obviously, information is not “evil” – only acts of people are evil.

Q: But why make it easy for people who want to harm others to obtain information on how to do it?

Hoy. Why make it difficult for honest people to find out anything they want to know about anything they want to know about? It isn't information that harms anybody – it is action. You could make a similar case against just about anything – knives, for example. Now, there is something that actually can be used to hurt somebody, and it isn't theoretical, either. There are thousands of known instances where knives have been used to rob, harm, and even kill people. And knives are for sale everywhere! In literally every town in America, anybody can walk in and buy as many knives as they want, with no questions asked. But I am not aware of anybody who wants to outlaw knives.

However, there are people who think publishers should be jailed, or sued, for publishing books about knives. As far as I can figure, censors, whatever their stated rationales, are people who fear knowledge. That's what it is. They don't want people to know. But anybody who would be put in charge of banning books would themselves have to know what was in the books, or how else could they determine that a book is “bad?” Censors think they should be allowed to read the very books they want to imprison us for reading!

I don't want anybody telling me that I can't read something. Nobody but me has the right to decide that for me.

Q: So would-be censors are trying to manipulate people via their fear of the unknown?

Hoy. Exactly. And the less you know, the more susceptible you are to manipulation via your ignorance. That's what all “leaders” do. It's how they try to make themselves seem necessary – they're going to protect you from some vague menace, and the vaguer the menace, the more ignorant you have to be to fall for their line. They don't want you to have facts at your command, or to know how to think.

Just look at the dazzling array of vague menaces the mass media tries to scare us with every single day. “Terrorists,” “Satanists,” “Pedophiles,” “Drug Dealers,” and so on. Whenever, say, some fucked up kid shoots a few people at a school, it is blared on every channel for days, weeks, months, even years afterwards, creating the false impression that “it can happen anywhere.” The fact is, that insofar as school shootings are concerned, they have hardly ever happened anywhere. A kid actually has a better chance of being struck by lightning on the playground than to be shot by another student.

They want you to be afraid. They don't want you to be calm and sensible, and efficacious, and in charge of yourself. They want you to come running to them. And their “solutions” are never more freedom. It's always less freedom, more surveillance, more rules, more laws, more cops, more “teachers,” and more snitches. Most high schools now have surveillance cameras in them, on the pretense that they are “protecting” the kids from being shot. Actually, no school shooting has ever been solved by surveillance cameras. Those cameras are there to catch the kids breaking petty rules, such as sneaking a joint, or something equally harmless. And to train the kids to get used to always being spied on.

That's what compulsory schooling is really all about. John Taylor Gatto makes it clear in his book Dumbing Us Down that the hidden curriculum of public schools is to turn us into docile state/corporate worker bees. One of the most brilliant of their deceptions is the false equation of schooling with education. They are not the same thing at all. Schooling means going to school – period. Education means learning – and most real learning takes place outside of school. I mean, just think of anything you know how to do. Anything. Riding a bicycle, for instance. You know how to ride a bike, don't you? How did you learn that? Did you go to a taxpayer-financed, chain-link-fence-surrounded, surveillance-camera-infested government building, sit in your assigned seat afraid to say a word unless a tax-consuming bureaucrat gave you permission, and then suck up to him so he will give you a good “grade?” No. You just went out and did it, that's how you learned to ride a bike. And it is the same with just about everything. School is the worst way to try to learn anything.

Q: So the less we know, the easier we are to manipulate?

Hoy. The less we know, and the less we are able to find things out, and the less we want to find things out. The best thing for them is to get us so we do not want to think for ourselves. Then we will fall for their phony baloney. Look at how they try to scare us about “drugs,” for instance. They never admit the positive side of drugs, the real reasons why people take them. They always find some case of a person who can't handle some substance, and then try to pretend that every case of a person taking that drug will have that negative result.

For example, consider methamphetamine. Now there is a drug that has been thoroughly demonized. Most people think meth is just plain “bad,” but like any other drug, it can be, and is, used without harm by lots of people. The US military gives methamphetamine to its pilots to help them stay awake while they are carpet-bombing Third World civilians. But you don't see whoever the current “Drug Czar” is trumpeting that fact. They will always pick out some pathetic junkie who got strung out on meth, and then claim that it is the fault of the drug. And unless we keep meth super-outlawed, and even consider imprisoning people who write about meth, then your kids are going to wind up like that junkie.

What faulty reasoning! That is like pointing to a wino lying drunk in the gutter and saying, “Look what an evil substance wine is. We must protect our children from the menace of wine! Let's have the death penalty for wine traffickers! Anyone who would write, publish, read or possess a book of winemaking recipes should go to prison for years! If that's what it takes to protect our kids from wine, then I'm in favor of it.”

Look how stupid that is. I don't think anyone but the most maniacal prohibitionist would actually say that about wine, but the fact is, it's the same for every other “drug.” Some people can't handle various drugs, but that's no reason to make them generally illegal for everyone. Some people can't drive cars without causing harm, but cars should be generally available. Same with guns, or anything else. General prohibition is stupid, and can only be maintained by increasing stupidity.

You can only maintain general prohibition by demonizing the prohibited item. If it were illegal to wear blue socks, then you would have a “Blue Socks Czar” who would be foghorning away about the Menace of Blue Socks, and this could only be gotten away with if you have a population so dumbed down and afraid that they could believe this shit. And people would be encouraged to give anonymous tips to the pigs about “Blue Socks Dealers,” and then when the cops break into somebody's house and assassinate them, the media will report “another Blue Socks related death.”

We are living in a truly insane society, and it is a task just to try to keep your head clear. You really can't believe anything “They” say.

Q: So that is why you think freedom of the press is so important.

Hoy. Yes, it is. Freedom of expression is what makes all our other freedoms possible. So think for yourself, have fun, and buy some books!