Garden of Eden story so effectively illustrates. It seems to be indigenous to human nature to give vent to its curiosity and to go on expanding its area of interest and study.

"But you still haven't answered our fundamental claim that reading immoral books leads to immoral acts," say the censors. So let us, therefore, examine this aspect of the question. The authors of The Freedom to Read point out chat since censors ordinalily assume characteristic responses to the books they would ban, it would be instructive to learn whether readers of these books do in fact perceive the content of the book in the fashion in which the censors claim." (The Freedom to Read, p. 74). Judge Bok stated that "it is impossible to say just what his (the average modern reader's) reactions to a book actually are." (The Right to "ead, p. 149.)

In view of the extreme difficulty in running an experiment on what reading does to people, few, if any, large scale studies of this have ever been done. Therefore, the censors have no empirical evidence on which to base their

statements.

Moreover, many sociologists and psychiatrists have come to take the view of Dr. Benjamin Karpman, who says, "contrary to popular misconception, people who read salacious literature are less likely to become sexual offenders who than those do not, for the reason that such reading often neutralizes what aberrant sexual instinct they may have." (The Journal of the American Medical Association, June 23, 1951.)

Robert Lindner, psychoanalyst and author of many books on psychoanalysis in a letter to the editor of The Saturday Review stated, "I am utterly opposed to censorship of the written word regardless of the source of such censorship of the type of material it is directed against. As a psychoanalyst who has had more than a decade of experience with the emotionally disturbed and especially with delinquents, I am convinced of the absurdity of the idea that any form of reading matter... can either provoke delinquent criminal be havior or instruct toward such ends." He goes on to say, "my own belief is that it is sheer futility to spend time and effort on attempts at censorship. I am convinced that were all so-called objectionable books and like material affect to disappear from the face of the earth tomorrow this would in no way the statistics of crime, delinquincy, amoral and anti-social behavior or personal illness and distress." (Saturday Review, May 12, 1955.)

Dr. Mandel Sherman, University of Chicago psychologist, concurs with Lindner in this matter. He has pointed out that a child may ascribe his be havior to a comic book or magazine that he has read, but such explantions cannot be considered scientific evidences of causation. The authors of The Freedom to Read also remark that it is assumed that no evidence is required to prove that suppressing a book removes a cause of the condition of immorality.

Realizing the changing scientific climate of opinion, Judge Bok in his 1949 mattachine REVIEW

ruling attempted to establish the principle that no book should be suppressed unless it could be deomostrated that there was a clear and present danger of the commission of a crime as a result of its publication. Paul Blanchard points out that although the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania supported Judge Bok on all other parts of his ruling, his reasoning was not supported on the above point.

Let us next take a look at present homosexuals for further invalidation of the censor's argument that obscene literature corrupts youth. There are in this country today somewhere between 12 and 15 million homosexuals. Let each of them ask himself, "DidI become homosexual by reading books or magazines on the subject?" I believe the answer will be a universal NO! Most of my readers will realize that homosexual inclinations come about from something much more basic in one's personality, and that one's personality orientation is not changed by the mere reading of books, But what's just as interesting for our purposes is that until recently no such books were available to the general reading public. Whatever many present-day homosexuals have learned about homosexuality came about either by word of mouth information, or what they learned from study of their own behavior.

Thus to the argument that the availability of homosexual literature affords an opportunity for the spread of crime and perversion becomes ineffectual when faced with the fact that the non-availability of such literature does not stop crime nor so-called perversion.

Lindner and other authorities agree that to find the causes of anti-social and "immoral" behavior, we must look deeper into our society than the objectionable literature. The causes of delinquincy and anti-social behavior lie in the family, in the church, the school and other social institutions. It is these institutions that have failed in their job of educating the young. It is a mark of the censor that his emphasis is almost always on the symptom and rarely on the cause. Whether the majority of the censors rarely visit libraries or buy books themselves can certainly be asked, because they have condemned the classic literature along with the trash. "The censors seem totally to lack faith in the role of parents, the school and the church." (The Censorship of Books, p. 70.)

Conclusion

Perhaps the reader feels helpless in the face of these all-out attempts to keep him from reading about homosexuality. But there are ways in which each of us can help stem the tide of censorship. For many years the American Civil Liberties Union has maintained an active interest in the problems of censorship. They have helped to get books cleared by the courts in numerous instances. I would urge all readers of this article to become members of ACLU. Membership costs only $2 yearly, and this is well-spent considering that it goes to help keep freedom of the press and speech in our country.

If you live in a city where there is a censorship board or other types of