Scroll down to read this post.

 

Readers!

 

The time has come for my annual short pre-Thanksgiving/Christmas fund drive for Behind The Black. I must do this every year in order to make sure I have earned enough money to pay my bills.

 

For this two-week campaign, I am offering a special deal to encourage donations. Donations of $200 will get a free autographed copy of the new paperback edition of Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, while donations of $250 will get a free autographed copy of the new hardback edition. If you desire a copy, make sure you provide me your address with your donation.

 

As I noted in July, the support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.

 

In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.

 

Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.

 

Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:

 

4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


Pushback: The momentum builds against the Marxist American Library Association

Emily Drabinski, now president of the ALA, proudly Marxist and queer
Emily Drabinski, president of the ALA and proudly
Marxist and queer

Bring a gun to a knife fight: Back in July I reported how the library commission of Montana had decided to withdraw its support from and membership in the American Library Association (ALA), not only because of the Marxist agenda being pushed by its new president, Emily Drabinski, but because of the ALA’s aggressive effort to insert pornography in school libraries.

At the time I wrote this:

[I]f more local library organizations followed through as Montana has, the ALA might finally feel the pinch and rethink its policies. Or if it didn’t, it would justify these libraries leaving its fold, as it does not represent them.

Since then there has been a rising flood of other states moving to break free from the ALA. In July, almost immediately after the decision in Montana, the secretary of state of Missouri, who oversees the Missouri State library, withdrew from the ALA, citing the organization’s public effort — pushed under Drabinski’s leadership — to block a “faith-based publisher from holding story hours in libraries.”

Soon thereafter state representatives in Texas [pdf], in Idaho, in Wyoming, in Georgia, in Mississippi, in Arizona, in South Carolina, and in Pennsylvania were demanding that their state libraries withdraw from the ALA. In addition, there are reports of similar moves in Louisiana, Illinois, and South Dakota.

That makes thirteen states that in less than two months have either withdrawn from the ALA or are beginning the legislative process for withdrawing.

While in the latter states there will likely be strong resistance from the libraries — most of which are now run by hardcore leftists indoctrinated by our bankrupt academia and who voted to make Drabinski head of the ALA — in the end the legislatures in these states control the purse, and most are conservative and generally controlled by Republicans, where we can expect some action because of the growing outrage from parents. This is now a hot political topic, one that politicians recognize could destroy them if they don’t make blunt moves to get porno out of the schools.

And trust me, the ALA and its leadership are definitely working to introduce porno and the queer agenda to little kids. Drabinski — who has made no secret of her Marxist leanings and is a proud and public lesbian — received 54% of the votes in winning her election as ALA president, suggesting that the membership of the ALA was strongly in favor of her desire to strengthen and extend its long-standing policies in favor of Marxist and queer advocacy, including drag queen story hours for little kids. There is also ample evidence that ALA itself supports the censorship of conservative thought.

Unless there is a drastic change at the ALA, something none of us should expect, it is entirely right and proper that state and local libraries consider ending all support for this organization. While the ALA should certainly be free to advocate such radical and perverse ideas, but there is no reason others should subsidize its depraved agenda.

One final thought: It is essential that parents nationwide continue to put pressure on school boards and state legislatures to end any association with this organization. There is no guarantee that these conservative legislators will follow through with their press statements condemning the ALA. In fact, past history tells us they likely won’t, unless strong and unrelenting continuous pressure is brought to bear. Sadly, Americans for decades have too quickly accepted meaningless press releases as a replacement for actual action. It is far past time to stop doing so.

Milton Freedman once said, “The way you solves things is by making it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing.” Americans have to make it very unprofitable for politicians to do the wrong thing.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

14 comments

  • Cotour

    Related: The other day I was having a general conversation with a customer about politics, and he throws into the mix: “What about Florida, they have banned 350 books! And he added the abortion issue just to round things off.

    I said that I had not really been paying attention to it but I would look into it.

    This is what I came up with:

    But the books are selectively banned in school districts where young children attend. It is not an absolute ban on books in the state of Florida.

    More Than 350 Books Banned in Florida Schools | Miami New Times

    Which poses the question: Should parents have a say in what their young children from kindergarten to say 12 (?) years old should be having assigned by their teachers and poured into their child’s head regarding literature? And some of the literature is without doubt promoting subjects and lifestyles that many parents do not want their young children exposed to. Now I am not a parent, but I would think they might want to have a say, no?

    Is that not reasonable? Why should a parent not have choice regarding their child and what they are taught in school?

    (And many teachers today as well as those who administer the schools are teachers / indoctrinators as many parents see them. And the teachers clearly state the same)

    “State universities indoctrinate future teachers in controversial transgender, racial, and political theories—and instruct them to teach these principles to children beginning in preschool, a new report has found.”

    This is a form of internal political conquest.

    And those young people who want to read those banned books certainly will have access to them and will read them no matter what anyone has to say about it. But just maybe when they are little older.

    This book banning issue, just like the abortion issue is a political strategy bright line issue that keeps people separated, in opposition, in their political “tribe” and busy being emotionally upset and a solid reliable vote.

    Neither political hot button issue is a black and white clean-cut issue as they are presented.

    Abortion at 8 months, 3 weeks, 6 days and 23 hours + ? Really? Some say yes, most however say no and draw a reasonable line.

    Politics: The dirtiest, filthiest most corrupt activity that human beings participate in.

    And then I threw this into the mix, Senator John Kennedy questioning people on this exact subject of essentially pornography being taught to young children: https://youtu.be/KBhy_vlgKS4?si=nhilkmMVo598LhJR Timing is everything in life.

    The radical Left cannot ever present ANYTHING in an honest and rational manner and in proper context because EVERTHING that they propose is designed to mislead in the furtherance of the radical “Fundamental Change” in America. Accent on mental.

  • Jay

    I was reading last week that some libraries in Idaho have broken off with the ALA as well.

  • Cotour

    Again, timing:

    Mike Lee: https://youtu.be/-EisQTfGGeY?si=HFaoKRmi422B34sW

    It is all a subterfuge and a dishonest lie in order to indoctrinate and control young children.

    There is no Book Ban, there is however a need by parents to have a say in what their children are required to absorb and study in school.

  • Jay: You are correct. Several local libraries in several states have not waited for their state government and taken positive action to remove the pornographic books and break from the ALA.

  • madrocketsci

    More worrying, there is this:
    https://scottlocklin.wordpress.com/2023/07/28/death-of-the-physical-library/

    I remember reading many articles about libraries mass-destroying books that they had removed to “storage” because “no one reads them anymore”.

  • Chris

    In the video clip Milton Freedman states: ” …you need to make the wrong people do the right things.” He doesn’t understand the “True Believer”

    What is a True Believer? – Joseph Stalin, Adolph Hitler, Pol Pot …etc. were True Believers – money or any other temptation would not sway them from their intended goals. No doubt their are also good True Believers – Pope John Paul II is one person I believe was a True Believer who helped drive our world toward goodness. Nothing would have swayed him from this.

    Why mention this notion of the True Believer? It is because many of the people we are against are True Believers. Money, or any other temptation will not sway them. We may be able to change some of their minds – others are hard set and will never turn.
    We cannot win them over by defunding them – they will always be there. Waiting,

  • Cotour

    “We may be able to change some of their minds – others are hard set and will never turn. We cannot win them over by defunding them – they will always be there. Waiting,”

    Chris, you are 100% correct.

    Neither money nor logic and plain to see common sense will turn them from their goal. Thay are true believers.

    And they will always be there, waiting.

    And if and when they no longer are waiting and have prevailed then what happened under those who you list will once again happen in the world, only America may not be there to stop it and may well become the epicenter of its germination.

    Then what? The U.N. saves the world? The radical Leftist Democrat party saves the world? The RINO Republican party saves the world? The WEF and the WHO saves the world? The CCP saves the world?

    Very dark days may be upon us all.

  • David Telford

    I wonder the psychology of players like this, avowed marixists like the BLM queens. Do they think to themselves, “this will make the world a better place”, or is it perhaps, “this will get them for what they did to me”?

    My take, the former is balderdash, the latter… people grinding an ax probably shouldn’t wield power.

  • Cotour

    It is the later.

    And their thinking is what was was so bad and evil because the mass of the general public in society did not accept me and my particular quirks and personality traits as being normal that anything else will be better when *WE* are in control.

    I have had “progressives” state to me that “Everything will be ok in 15 to 25 years”, meaning when people like me and about half of the country were dead. And I pointed out:

    The only problem being: All SUBJECTIVE forms of governance are ultimately authoritarian and is evil. And you become what it is that you say that you despise.

    And that is why they are so driven and are “true believers”. They are blind to what they will or are now becoming.

  • James Street

    David Telford, I think about the same thing.

    Benedict Groeschel had PhDs in psychology and theology and did a great job integrating psychology and spirituality. I’ve read several of his books and this is a psychological chart “continuum” from one of them:
    https://jamesstreet804.files.wordpress.com/2023/09/groeschel-continuum.jpg

    Groeschel’s “continuum” doesn’t pigeonhole people the way some psychological measuring devices like Myers–Briggs or the MMPI might. Instead the person can move wherever they are on the continuum towards normal (what Groeschel calls “adjusted”) through healthy choices. The problem is the life styles and thought processes these radical leftists are doing are extremely unhealthy and moves them deeper and deeper into the dark side.

    In the summary at the bottom of the chart Groeschel writes “Human beings have a great capacity for immense good and for immense evil.”

  • Rabindranath E Ramcharan

    I was looking for Mikhail Sholokhov’s “And Quiet Flows the Don” at our local public library last night, but it turns out that they don’t have a copy. Which is weird, since the novel won the Stalin Prize in 1941. I looked a little further in, and I found out that library doesn’t have an unabridged edition of the Gulag Archipelago. Which I guess is less surprising.

  • Margaret

    Our library in suburban Chicago had many books in storage until more space was built and then, instead of returning the classics to the shelves, many were given to Friends of the Library to sell. Granted, the public wants to be able to borrow the latest novels and non-fiction, but try borrowing a classic, even with the ability of accessing other affiliated libraries (inter-library loan). They just aren’t available. Sometimes the local thrift stores have good donations for $1-3 each.

    We are being impoverished financially and intellectually.

    Have you noticed that all novels since about 2018 now have a gay person or couple featured (in heroic roles)? I’m guessing that in order to get published, one must include this rarity. In what must have been a blatant shot back, a novel I read a few years a few years ago had the son of one of the main characters come out as gay on the last page. His name had never appeared before! “You want gay, here’s your gay!”

  • Cotour

    Related: The continuing validation of the principles related to Strategy Over Morality and “The Two Conversations”:

    https://youtu.be/XhBBAOodRJk?si=IUAVsZ7tV31E9ZFi

    https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/strategy-over-morality-1

    Why is the government always lying to the public? Because they can justify it. Truth is not the job of government governing is the job of the government and the two are not related.

    And the ONLY thing that Objectively attempts to ensure that the people have access to some degree of truth regarding what the always Subjective government is doing is the Constitution which precedes and structures the government.

  • pzatchok

    Margaret

    I have noticed the trend of gay characters since long before 2018. Try 1990.
    I have noticed homosexual characters in books before then but not in almost every scifi book published. Now they are just thrown in for no apparent story reason at all.

    Even my very liberal mother is starting to notice it what she reads and watches.

Readers: the rules for commenting!

 

No registration is required. I welcome all opinions, even those that strongly criticize my commentary.

 

However, name-calling and obscenities will not be tolerated. First time offenders who are new to the site will be warned. Second time offenders or first time offenders who have been here awhile will be suspended for a week. After that, I will ban you. Period.

 

Note also that first time commenters as well as any comment with more than one link will be placed in moderation for my approval. Be patient, I will get to it.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *