Catholic League members are familiar with the many ads that we’ve run on the op-ed page of the New York Times. We are most proud of the fact that some of these ads have been picked up by museums. Now we’ve made an entry in a college textbook, Making Sense of Media, authored by George Rodman. The book, which is published by Allyn and Bacon, is widely used in communications classes.
The ad that was selected, “Will the Real Censors Please Stand Up!”, was written by William Donohue when the movie “Dogma” was about to be released. At that time, Dan Petrocelli, attorney for film’s producer’s, Harvey and Bob Weinstein, as well as for the movie’s director, Kevin Smith, attempted to intimidate the league by sending a threatening letter to Donohue. But it backfired when Donohue printed the ad in theTimes charging Petrocelli and company with censorship.
The ad appears in chapter one of the book in a section called, “Controversy: The Many Meanings of ‘Censorship.’” Author Rodman provides a fair presentation of this issue in the chapter entitled, “Making Sense of the World of Media.” We are pleased that our work continues to provide a basis for serious discussion.a
