The Best Censorship Political Books 2025

1. Yes, I Can Say That: When They Come for the Comedians, We Are All in Trouble, Pre-Owned (Hardcover)

Pre-Owned - No one makes me laugh harder than Judy Gold. If I had to pick one comedian to write a book about free speech, it would be Judy. - Amy Schumer From award-winning comedian Judy Gold, an equal parts thoughtful and hilarious polemic on the current efforts to censor comedians, arguing that they undermine the art--and purpose--of comedy itself. You can say anything that comes to mind as long as it is funny. -- Richard Pryor The fallout after Michelle Wolf's roast at the 2018 White House Correspondent's Dinner, Samantha Bee's forced apology after calling Ivanka Trump a feckless c*nt, Kathy Griffin's being blacklisted from Hollywood after posting a photo with what looked like the president's severed head, all represent a dangerous and growing trend--to censor comedians. In Yes I Can Say That, comedy veteran Judy Gold argues that no one has the right to tell comics what they can or cannot joke about.... Laughter is a unifier. It's the best medicine. It's also the most palatable way to bring up seditious, subversive topics. For Gold, nothing is more insidious than enforcing silence and repressing jokes--the job of a comedian is to expose society's demons, and confront them head-on, no prisoners allowed. In ten impassioned polemics, she frames comedy as a tool of empowerment, a way to reclaim hateful rhetoric and battle the democracy-crushing plight of censorship. Uninhibited and bold, Gold is as skilled at making readers laugh as she is at exposing uncomfortable truths about our culture and society. In this era of partisan politics and gaping inequalities, Yes I Can Say That is the refreshingly candid, wickedly funny and deliciously blunt manifesto we need.

Yes, I Can Say That: When They Come for the Comedians, We Are All in Trouble, Pre-Owned (Hardcover)

2. Voices in the Whirlwind, and Other Essays, Used [Paperback]

Voices in the Whirlwind, and Other Essays by Es'kia Mphahlele

Voices in the Whirlwind, and Other Essays, Used [Paperback]

3. Democracy and the Mass Media: A Collection of Essays [Paperback - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. In this volume a group of distinguished legal and political theorists and experts on journalism discuss how to reconcile our values concerning freedom of the press with the enormous power of the media - especially television - to shape opinions and values. The policy issues treated concern primarily the extent of justifiable government regulation of the media and the justification for regulating television differently from newspapers. The volume contains some highly original and groundbreaking analyses of philosophical issues surrounding the First Amendment of the US Bill of Rights. This is a book for anyone seriously interested in the rights to free speech and expression in technologically advanced societies.

Democracy and the Mass Media : A Collection of Essays, Used [Paperback]

4. Censored 2020 [Paperback - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. In the midst of Trump's attacks on the media, comes this look at the rigorous, independent reporting of the year's most underreported news stories. While the country's president displays a brazen disregard for the First Amendment and routinely demonizes the press as "the enemy of the people," Censored 2020 looks beyond Donald Trump's dizzying contempt for the truth to clarify the corporate media's complicity in misinforming the American public--while also providing a clear vision of a better future, based on rigorous, trustworthy independent reporting that presents a fuller picture of truth. With a discerning eye, Censored 2020 focuses the public's attention on the most important but underreported news stories of 2018-2019. These stories expose the corporate news media's systemic blind spots while highlighting the crucial role played by independent journalists in providing the kind of news necessary for informed, engaged citizens. The book also examines this year's lowlights in "junk food news" and "news abuse"--further revealing how corporate news often functions as propaganda--as well as highlights of exemplary organizations that champion "Media Democracy in Action." Additional chapters address the importance of constructive journalism, the untold story of Kashmir, news coverage of LGBTQ issues in the Trump era, "fake news" as a Trojan horse for censorship, and online memes as a form of political communication.

Censored 2020, Used [Paperback]

5. Law of Public Communication-Annual Update 2010 (7th Edition), Used [Paperback]

The 2010 Update of this top-selling media law text includes the most current legal developments affecting the daily work of writers, broadcasters, advertisers, cable operators, Internet service providers, public relations practitioners, photographers, and other public communicators. By presenting statutes and cases in a cohesive manner that is understandable, even to readers studying law for the first time, the authors ensure that readers will acquire a firm grasp of the legal issues affecting the media.

Law of Public Communication-Annual Update 2010, Used [Paperback]

6. Media Concentration and Democracy : Why Ownership Matters, Used [Hardcover]

Firmly rooting its argument in democratic and economic theory, the book argues that a more democratic distribution of communicative power within the public sphere and a structure that provides safeguards against abuse of media power provide two of three primary arguments for ownership dispersal. It also shows that dispersal is likely to result in more owners who will reasonably pursue socially valuable journalistic or creative objectives rather than a socially dysfunctional focus on the 'bottom line'. The middle chapters answer those agents, including the Federal Communication Commission, who favor 'deregulation' and who argue that existing or foreseeable ownership concentration is not a problem. The final chapter evaluates the constitutionality and desirability of various policy responses to concentration, including strict limits on media mergers.

Media Concentration and Democracy : Why Ownership Matters, Used [Hardcover]

7. For Rushdie: Essays by Arab and Muslim Writers in Defense of Free Speech [Paperback - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. For Rushdie contains the first collection of texts by Arab and Muslim writers from Maghreb to the Middle East, from Iran, Turkey, from Bangladesh, and the former Soviet Union, who express their support for both Rushdie and the right to free expression. This collection represents an unprecedented political act. Not content merely to shed new light on the Rushdie affair, this work opens a free space for communication. Several writers pointedly draw attention to the threats and accusations suffered by many intellectuals today at the hands of religious extremists. Several recall the murders of the Egyptian writer Farag Fouda last year and the Algerian writer Tahar Djaour in May, while others warn of the deepening confrontation between secular freedoms and Islamic fundamentalism. Many of the writers themselves have been forced into exile. Many draw attention to the reactions in the West to Rushdie's case. All condemn the violence now associated with the repression of free speech.

For Rushdie: Essays by Arab and Muslim Writers in Defense of Free Speech, Used [Paperback]

8. James Joyce, Sexuality and Social Purity [Hardcover - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. In James Joyce, Sexuality and Social Purity, Katherine Mullin offers a richly detailed account of Joyce's lifelong battle against censorship. Through prodigious archival research, Mullin shows Joyce responding to Edwardian ideologies of social purity by accentuating the 'contentious' or 'offensive' elements in his work. The censorious ambitions of the social purity movement, Mullin claims, feed directly into Joyce's writing. Paradoxically, his art becomes dependent on the very forces that seek to constrain and neutralize its revolutionary force. Acutely conscious of the dangers censorship presented to publication, Mullin shows Joyce revenging himself by energetically ridiculing purity campaigns throughout his fiction. Ulysses, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Dubliners all meticulously subvert purity discourse, as Joyce pastiches both the vice crusaders themselves and the imperilled 'Young Persons' they sought to protect. This important book will change the way Joyce is read and offers crucial insights into the sexual politics of Modernism.

James Joyce, Sexuality and Social Purity, Used [Hardcover]

9. Matusow Affair: Memoir of a National Scandal [Hardcover - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. Matusow Affair: Memoir of a National Scandal by Albert Kahn

Matusow Affair: Memoir of a National Scandal, Used [Hardcover]

10. Censorship (Current Controversies) [Paperback - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. Articles on varying perspectives on censorship cover topics such as if offensive speech should be censored, if high schools and universities should censor, and if pornographic and violent material should be censored.

Censorship, Used [Paperback]