The List that Time forgot

I was glancing at the new look CayCompass when this caught my eye ...

Book ban still in force

Good to see that some tendril of the Civil Service brambleweed is engaged in looking out for the soul of Cayman, I thought. These are dire times: another child gunned down, this one almost a baby, by monkey-see-monkey-shoot gangstas.

Still at least those wanabee bad-asses won't be able to read literature that may corrupt them further, no suh!

Although the law has not been updated in 12 years and lists publications that are out of print or discontinued, it is still being enforced by Customs and Excise officers.
“Once the law is on the books, it will be enforced,” said assistant collector of Customs and Excise Trevor Williams.

 'Leg Show' and 'Swank'' are banned for example but not Playboy' - then again Heffner has money and rich friends and may like to build or buy in Cayman.

I read the list of banned publications with growing amazement. The sub-text of the list is less about common decency and more  "Permit nothing that would get the locals uppity or overstimulated": there are some real boners (oops, Freudian slip there) on the list.

For example 'Evergreen' - a UK publication aimed at the elderly that concerns itself with things like happy childhood memories, Olde England,  and pictorials on quaint parish churches and cottage gardens.

Banning a thing increases its desirability and, knowing dollars speak louder than words in Cayman, I expect there is a  literary shebeen tucked away in a backstreet selling copies of 'Evergreen' in discreet brown wrappers.

Picture the scene, Little Nicky, collar pulled high and casting nervous glances about him, enters the establishment.

Ah Reverend, good day!

Oh, er, good day.

Sorry but this month's 'Swank' never made it past Customs but 'Evergreen' did. It was inside a copy of Playboy. There's a great centerfold of Salisbury Cathedral. I ain't never seen flying buttresses like it! Nice set of cloisters too!

Er, thank you. I only buy it for the crossword you know.

Whatever you say Rev. That'll be 50 bucks please. Yes all in ones is OK.

Equally bizzare  is this ban:

All publications published by persons or firms whose address is Suite 2305, 450 7^th Avenue, New York

The present occupants of that address, Coalfire Systems, are specialists in the field of IT Security and Auditing - why would their publications be banned in the Cayman Islands?  Is auditing such an undesirable activity. Sorry, silly question.

The ban on some of the milder forms of erotic and sexual literature, given the ready access to cable-tv-sex and the internet seems rather passé. Educating boys and young men that women aren't sex objects for their immediate gratification (so they don't, say, go out and rape and murder them like poor Estella) is first and foremost a parental duty isn't it? Sorry again, what am I thinking - everything is Government's job isn't it? Then again as half the population is in government jobs ...


In the age of the internet expecting Customs to hold back an incoming tide of filth and subversion is as futile as King Cnut trying to hold back the sea - although I have heard it said Customs and Excise do act like a bunch of Cnuts (anag.)