At the dawn of the Trump era, Muslims were vilified and banned. Then it was Mexicans, then it was Blacks. Now it’s Jews.
Maus is ranked by many, including me, among the great literary masterpieces of the 20th Century. It won the Pulitzer Prize and is universally loved. Except in Tennessee, which has just started banning it from schools.
And let’s not kid ourselves. The “swear words” and “nude mice” they pretend to object to are the flimsiest of excuses. The real aim is to suppress the teaching of a book that makes the experience of the Holocaust vivid, real, and poignant. Banning Maus is Holocaust denial, plain and simple, a blatant (and tediously obvious) attempt to revise history to ensure that America’s Nazis and White supremacists never feel uncomfortable.
Muslims, Mexicans, Blacks, Jews. It won’t stop there. America’s ugly history of ethnic intolerance has never wanted for people to hate.