from the fighting-works dept It was just a week or so ago that we were talking about the absurd situation in Knox County, Tennessee, where local government used Tennessee’s book-banning laws to remove the book Roots from school libraries. Yes, this is the book by Alex Haley that spawned the 1970s miniseries of the same name and served as a cultural touchpoint for the understanding of American history and race relations across the country. Haley lived in Knox County himself. He even has a bronze statue placed in his honor in Morningside Park in Knoxville. Yet the book that earned him that statue was being banned in public schools. The backlash to this occurring was swift and severe. It came from both local politicians and from the public around the country. The purity of just how bad and wrong this was hit a nerve. And, now, the county has caved to that pressure and have immediately reinstated Roots back onto public school bookshelves .…