VA School PullTo Kill A Mockingbird’, ‘Huck Finn’ From Shelves

[CrusaderFrank]

@Ascleipias?
Is use of the word n*gger in the novels' dialogue of certain characters more important than the overall message?

It is part of the integral message, yes.

So you favor burning books that use the word in a manner not to your liking?

 

[Theowl32]

The left are the commies/socialists/fascists. How much more proof needs to be presented?

 

[dcbl]

I used to get my stepson books about boogers and other stuff that he thought was hilarious. It was definitely not in good taste, but it got him to read.

interdasting

hope you plan to change that philosophy when he turns 14 and 15 - make him sneak around and hide it like a NORMAL kid...

 

[dcbl]

Banning books is kind of nazi don't you think?

yes

yes I do

check out the gif in OP

 

[NYcarbineer]

Democrats are at war with information. They resort to book burning when they are angry or frustrated. The current gov of Va. is a democrat who used to work in the Clinton administration.

Accomack County voted Republican in the last 5 presidential elections.

 

[dcbl]

I want more freedom and more ability to say what you wish to say. Isn't that why we have the first amendment?

most people used to feel that way, no matter what their party affiliation or political views

today, they are enforcing speech codes on major college campuses

it's actually kind of scary

 

[Tommy Tainant]

Huck Finn is a work of genius. It only loses its momentum at the end when Tom Sawyer turns up . How can you teach American literature without teaching this ?

 

[cnm]

Still, Mark Twain...

The Noble Red Man

 

[bripat9643]

I used to get my stepson books about boogers and other stuff that he thought was hilarious. It was definitely not in good taste, but it got him to read.

interdasting

hope you plan to change that philosophy when he turns 14 and 15 - make him sneak around and hide it like a NORMAL kid...

He's a junior in college now. He was on the dean's list the last time I checked up with him.

 

[OldLady]

This really doesn't have much to do with politics, Flacaltenn. It's an approach to accessing literature for young people. Delve into works involving issues and settings they can relate to. I was among those kids who read The Outsiders and a lot of other young adult lit, AS WELL as Tom Sawyer and Shakespeare's plays. As a huge admirer of Mark Twain, I hate to see him off the shelf, but he is a hard slog for some readers, and the kids would be far more interested in stories about their own time and place. There are counter arguments to all of this, I realize, but I really don't think it's about left and right so much.

It really IS politics when you've confronted it in a place like California. It's a belief that the American past and heritage is SOO ugly and tainted, that it OFFENDS too many groups and identities. And HAS to be removed.
Things like Mark Twain -- who happens to be one of the ONLY fictional authors that I've read the MAJORITY of his work..

That's the LEFT perspective that I've observed. THEN FlaCalTenn moves from lefty Cali to righty Tenn. Largely to prevent my daughter from fully transforming into a fluff-head Valley Girl. And I'm right in the middle of a fight started by the RIGHTY censors -- trying to pull "To Kill a Mockingbird" and others OUT of the libraries and reading lists here. THEIR MOTIVES were simply morality issues. NOT a better excuse, except maybe for grade appropriate use.

In the Cali case -- these zealots had a WHOLE LIST of replacement reading. Which was worse than a night watching HBO series. And there was NO WAY that was an intellectual or academic replacement for all the lit they did BAN.. In the Tenn case -- it was ISOLATED classics that conflicted with way folks exposed their children to adult topics.

It doesn't end there. Parents in both places were "protecting" their children. In Cali it was madness with helicopter parents STILL arranging playdates for Middle School kids and getting into adult fights about texts their children sent. While in Tenn, those kids are driving ATVs across yards/fields/woods without helmets, playing paintball, soft pellet gun games in the woods, and shooting Roman Candles on 4th of July at each other while the parents giggle about it. Seems like they TRUST their kids more and teach responsibility and respect in different ways.

That's why -- we're NOT "Stronger Together" or one big happy village. Because those choices have very DIFFERENT principles and goals attached to them. And having fought with BOTH sides about keeping the public schools NEUTRAL in those choices --- they both need Tolerance, Consistency, and Respect for that "neutrality".

Because THIS thread is nothing but a whole can of hypocritical whining to me.. .

Twain would be tickled, of course, that people are still screaming about his works. It's exactly what he meant to do.
I know it's occurred to you that you can share these great works with your daughter by going to the public library, even if the school believes it's damned.
You should read Merry Men by Carolyn Chute. All about class war between poor and rich/rural and not. I think you might actually enjoy it. It was an awesome novel, even if it is set in Maine.

My grandparents, who lived like survivalists, but weren't, had the entire Twain library. I later bought one for myself. Visited his newspaper room in Nevada City. Just crazed about his writings. Especially the preachy ones !!!

I'd never PUSH a son/daughter towards any fictional work. Not even the Bible or Harry Potter. Being pushed to read "Passage to India" completely BROKE ME in College. Went to the prof and told her -- I JUST COULD NOT DO IT.. I've touched very little fiction since if it wasn't Clancy or Creighton. And that is what was insidious about REPLACING classics with current literal shit in California. The replacement stuff was mind-blowingly bad.

All that said -- I made a note -- to take a look at Merry Men.

Absolutely you must NEVER push a book on a kid. If you bring it home and leave it on your bed stand and tell them they're too young to read it, it might work though. LOL I can see where Passage to India would be like bamboo under the fingernails for you. I felt the same way about DH Lawrence.
I'll have to check out Clancy--loved Crichton.

My parents never had to do that with me....I read voraciously...I hid books inside textbooks and pretended to read the textbook

I was a bookworm, too. Books are a marvelous escape into all sorts of strange and exciting lands.