How the States Waste Legislative Time and Money:Alabama

So, this morning I read about Mississippi wanting to ban fat people from restaurants.  As ridiculous as that seemed I decided to do some research.  I’m becoming obsessed with stupid bills and laws. 

What I found was astonishing in Alabama:

  • In 2005, according to CBS, Alabama had before it a bill that targeted Gay Authors.

Republican Alabama lawmaker Gerald Allen says homosexuality is an unacceptable lifestyle. As CBS News Correspondent Mark Strassmann reports, under his bill, public school libraries could no longer buy new copies of plays or books by gay authors, or about gay characters.

“I don’t look at it as censorship,” says State Representative Gerald Allen. “I look at it as protecting the hearts and souls and minds of our children.”

Books by any gay author would have to go: Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote and Gore Vidal. Alice Walker’s novel “The Color Purple” has lesbian characters.

Allen originally wanted to ban even some Shakespeare.

Luckily, not enough legislators showed up to vote, so the bill died on the vine.  Think what that bill could have done to the Bible reading conservatives!  Imagine…. outlawing Bibles!  Whoaaaa!

  • Some years ago, 1998 (I think), Alabama decided to protect its citizens from vibrators, but not guns.  In fact, rumor has it that on the day the legislature banned marital aids, there was a run on electric toothbrushes throughout Alabama.  (How did that work?)  Oh, well…. So much for “the pursuit of happiness”.

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