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Essay / Censorship in Plato's Republic - 2401
These concepts and measures he considered taking - i.e. censorship of art, the demand for productivity rather than morality, the concept that everyone has a place in society, the notion that everyone should do what they should do, the precept that people should not have property of their own but should be forced to work for them, eat and sharing in public with their community – would not result in the society he dreamed of but, in fact, would result in a horrible cascade of logic leading to a degeneration of order and morality and ultimately ending in tragic loss of humanity. The reasons are simple. First, censorship of art is nothing more than censorship of ideas that are both spontaneous AND inherent in people themselves. Censorship is therefore unnecessary. Second, censorship of art removes means of expression and liberation and will cause these negative acts to occur on a more regular basis. Third, and most importantly, children, who have no chance of doing good in their lives, will not experience evil and therefore will have no propensity to follow a given moral code. For them, there will be no morality, only goodness. Thus, censorship of art, in itself, will cause the negative effects mentioned above. This is why censorship of art will ruin the