Censorship

CENSORSHIP IS THE practice of restraining or con-trolling communication on the basis of content. Because of the strong tradition of First Amendment rights to freedom of expression, censorship has negative connotations in the United States, but in many other parts of the world it is an accepted part of life. Censorship may be formal, in which it is part of official government policy and enforced by police and the courts, or informal, in which community organizations indicate their disapproval of objectionable content. There are four basic types of censorship: morals, military, political, and religious.

In the United States, the political right is most frequently associated with morals censorship, and in particular the suppression of sexual content in the arts. Conservatives have traditionally been very concerned about ...