Rudolph Giuliani, mayor of New York City and self-appointed governor of public morality for that principality, has been making the news again.

This time it isn’t hookers and porno shops the Law and Order mayor wants to shut down.This time, Rudy wants to put the chokehold on art.

He is threatening to cut $7 million of funding if a collage of the Virgin Mary, which is made up of pornographic cutouts and elephant dung, is not removed from an exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

Go after the hookers and the skanky shops first and then attack the arts — all in the name of public standards of morality.

And many such attacks against freedom have started with the same self-righteous plea for sensitivity.

For example, in a country that celebrates freedom as loudly and proudly as the United States, you would think the subject of banned books would not be an issue, but it is.

Banning books isn’t just for Nazis and Communists; there are all sorts of interests that want to keep literature out of the reach of impressionable minds.

Maybe they think a book is too profane, racist or insensitive.

Imagine going to the library to pick up a copy of “Huckleberry Finn,” “Little House on the Prairie” or “Catcher in the Rye,” only to find out you can’t because someone finds them too offensive.

Sound ridiculous?

Well, these are just a small sampling of books that have been banned at one time or another from libraries across the country.

Banned books week started Sept. 25, and we are fortunate to have Carolivia Herron, author of “Nappy Hair,” speaking to our campus about her once- controversial book.

Herron wrote a children’s book to teach African American children to celebrate their ethnicity, and third grade teacher Ruth Sherman was forced to transfer schools for reading it to her class.

Parents unfamiliar with the book took offense to the title, and as a result, acted with fear and ignorance.

This is precisely why we all need to take this week to appreciate the freedom we often take for granted.

Herron is in a unique position to tell all of us about the effects book banning can have.

When you start banning books and muscling museums in the name of protecting the public from things some find offensive, it sets a bad precedent.

Because, believe it or not, it is a short step from banning books to burning them.