Thinking About … School Censorship

As a school librarian, censorship is a hot topic – especially because I work in a middle school. I have to make some books “8th grade only” and younger kids who want to borrow those books need a note from parents. For me – I remember reading “Up the Down Staircase” in 3rd grade because my high school sister was reading it. And most of it went right over my head. A little more made sense when I read it again in 7th grade, but I didn’t REALLY understand it til I read it in high school. Should someone have made me stop reading it when I was younger? No.

In my school, any time there was a book that had been deemed “controversial,” the school sent home a permission slip so parents could sign off on whether they wanted their kids to read it, or not. And I can’t remember a single instance where some helicopter parent voted AGAINST their child’s education, and said “no.” I still maintain that this is the best way to handle it. It’s too bad that the lowest common denominator of ignorance in this country is FAR too often given so much power to decide what people far brighter than them have and do NOT have the right to be exposed to.nnLook, the world is full of reality. And a lot of literature depicts it. And whether that means sex, violence, racism, drug use, coarse language, viewpoints other than your own or some combination of all of the above…you can either educate your kids and prepare them for life, or you can molly-coddle them, and keep them sheltered from the world. And guess what? One way or the other, reality always wins. nnWhen I was in Junior High and High School, I read “To Kill a Mockingbird,” “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” “The Catcher in the Rye,” “The Great Gatsby,” “Of Mice and Men,” “Candide,” “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” “Brave New World,” and loads of other “challenged” books. Some had been assigned to me, but some were books I read for the hell of it. And y’know what? I didn’t turn into a murderer, racist, drug user or violent thug. What I DID turn into was an English major, and eventually, a working writer. nnAll that said, I’m at least a LITTLE in favor of book-banning from a pragmatic perspective. What better way to get kids interested in reading amazing works of literature than to make them “forbidden fruit?” After all…It’s not like your local library or Barnes & Noble store really cards anyone, is it?

Censorship is just plain wrong when it comes to books. Books expand the mind, TV contracts it.

Nothing should be censored. Instead, a critical thinking course should be in the curriculum, and these books should be discussed. Remember, Huckleberry Finn was banned once, too. There’s a lot to be learned from banned books; don’t shut your mind!

Unfortunately, the scenario you explain is probably the case more often than not. nnThanks for rolling with us!

We start telling children what books they can and cannot read, and soon enought were telling them what clothes to wear, what music to listen to, what religion to practice, and eventually down this road we loose what makes this country great. In in Afganistan now, on one of many trips I make to the middle east all year. Ive been overseas 8 of the last 10 years, and one main reason we are STILL fighting this war, which noone wants to tell you, is the literacy rate of the host nations. We have been training “soldiers” for years and seen no real dividends. These lands still cannot govern and safeguard themselves. The fact is that its ten times more difficult to teach someone how to be a soldier, when that man cant read, write and count. Afganistan started this a long time ago by baning “western” books. Then in time it was everything but the Quran. You see ignorance isnt just bliss, its the preferred weapon of evil. We dictate what literature our children can and can’t read and we are opening the door. Mind you if wont happen overnight, and most of you say,”not in America, not here.” But the reality is it is possible, more so now than it ever has. Remember, every 1000 mile journey starts with single step.

TTP ROCKS and I’ll keep rollin’. I like that! Props to you and Teddy!

TTP ROCKS and I’ll keep rollin’. I like that! Props to you and Teddy!