Jefferson City, Missouri, March 3, 2020, Star-Gazer News Service–The Missouri House announced here today that when a bill proposing Gestapo-style Parental Advisory Committees is passed and signed into law, your favorite librarian may end up in the slammer.

House Representatives Jack and Monique (not their real names) admit that while it “takes a lot of arrogance to tell other people what they can and cannot read, such people can’t help themselves.”

According to informed spokespersons, the parental committees will be composed of adults who swear on a stack of comic books that “I don’t know anything about books, but I know what I don’t like.”

Dixon Ticonderoga, president of the Broken Pencil Think Tank, told reporters that studies show that teens read banned books sooner than other books.

“The bottom line is this: Banning books ensures that the age groups you don’t want to read the book will read then in greater numbers than they would if you just shut the hell up,” he said.

Librarians–who asked not to be named in print–noted that a “Missouri State Assessment of Adult Literacy (SAAL) conducted in 2003, 35% of Missouri adults have prose literacy skills at or below the basic skill level. In addition, 26% of Missouri adults are at or below the basic skills level in document literacy and 49% are at or below the basic skill level in quantitative literacy.”

Jack and Monique admit that the SAAL assessment shows that the parental committees will be “an example of the blind leading the stupid, and that’s what democracy is all about.”

Story filed by Jock Stewart, Special Investigative Reporter