This novel along with 'Huckleberry Finn' was one of the top anti-racist novels ever written in American English and it made the irrationality of racialism obviously plain to anyone that would read them. I knew a kid whose parents were known Kluxers who would not speak of these beliefs he had after reading the books. The books made him ashamed into silence.
But as white racialism returns in the guise of White Nationalism, these books are ironically enough being banned and held back from kids by leftwing Identity Politics morons who object to the realistic language of that time.
The left has gone totally and completely insane and even their top leadership is so deep intot he Twilight Zone that they cannot see Reality any more and dont care to anyway.
To Kill A Mockingbird: How An Anti-Racist Book Became A Target For 'Anti-Racists' - Breitbart
The American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom keeps track of complaints against Harper Lee’s most famous novel and the list of challenges to teaching the novel has been steadily growing since at least 1977. Indeed, To Kill A Mockingbird is one of the most banned books in America, mostly because of its alleged racism.
Let this stark irony not be lost on us. To ban Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird (1960) could not possibly be a more misjudged estimation of its worthiness as a novel about the odious nature of racism. To kill this good book by removing it from library shelves—as seems to be happening this week in my native Virginia—is to kill reason itself.
One recalls John Milton’s stirring words from his Areopagitica (1644): “[A]s good almost kill a Man as kill a good Book; who kills a Man kills a reasonable creature, God’s Image; but he who destroys a good Book, kills reason itself, kills the Image of God, as it were in the eye.”
That reason is not only a Platonic Form and an Enlightenment Ideal. It is carefully woven into Lee’s novel in the beautiful passages where the main characters are being kind, open-minded and reasonable with one another. In that reasonableness we find a counterpoint to the very ignorance, shallowness and unreasonableness of those who are moved to kill To Kill A Mockingbird.
In the misplaced zeal to do away with the alleged racial bigotry of the novel, censors tend to focus on individual words—especially the dreaded ‘n—–‘ word—and think their work of censorship is done. This microscopic, literalist view of language is a kind of parody of the spirit-letter distinction, focusing, as it does, on single elements in a narrative rather than on the general and generous spirit of an entire passage of the novel itself.
Anyone who has actually read all of To Kill A Mockingbird knows that the novel is a thoroughgoing critique of racism, not an advertisement for it. We are meant to feel the most profound sympathy for Tom Robinson, especially in the famous courtroom scene where Atticus Finch so compellingly defends him against the false accusation of the rape of a white woman....
It staggers the imagination how the novelist’s representation of fairness and its moral condemnation of racism can be easily twisted into its opposite. One simply cannot imagine a more desperately ignorant reading of the novel.
All of which goes to prove that one should never underestimate the power of liberal stupidity.
I guess if it were written by a Black author, such as Audrey Lourde,
then it would be understood and acceptable.
But White people and European writers, regardless if they are historical satirists from Mark Twain to Shakespeare,
aren't allowed to make statements about race since "they don't know what it feels like to be a minority person of color."
This is automatically deemed as racially biased, from a "predominantly White" perspective.
Closedmindedness shows in thinking the solution is to censor, shut down and cut these views out -- instead of opening the dialogue to ADD and include more in.
But if that is the minority reaction, to respond by attack and exclusion,
then by inclusion of cultural diversity of expression,
this "reaction" has to be allowed as their way of expressing their experience!
Same problem with LGBT responding to exclusion by seeking the equal
and opposite pattern of ATTACKS, rejection and even penalties against "anti-gay" advocates.
Instead of treating these as equal beliefs and expressions, and allowing both equally,
the same problem occurs with trying to exclude one and only defend the other as the right position.
Emily, this thread is a leftist smear that bears little semblance to reality. If I remember Mockingbird correctly, there is no attempt to see the world through a black man's eyes. It is all through the eyes of a white kid. Some people have moved (unsuccessfully) to ban it due to the town's bigotry, but equally because Jim was arrested for RAPE. OOOHHHHH, careful of putting that in front of teenagers. LOL
Mockingbird is a book about standing up against racism, doing the right thing regardless, but it wasn't in any way trying to give a "phony" black perspective. Anyone making that argument for the book didn't read it. (And sometimes the people bringing the complaint DON'T read the book--that happens more than you think. They just hear about it on their website or at their church group and they're off to the races.)
Dear
OldLady
A lot of the point I am making is what you are explaining. Thanks for elaborating,
though it merely preaches to the converted and doesn't help change minds that are already made up!
If all people do is assume any book written by a white author (and especially written from the
"Southern cultural perspective" at the time as both Huck Finn and Mockingbird depict),
is "promoting that racist culture" then nobody listens to and considers what you have stated.
Once they "have it in their minds it it biased"
then ALL the explanations you provide above
come across as 'trying to justify' and denying there is any problem with white cultural bias!
It falls on deaf ears because of that bias going into the discussion.
And the more you explain, it just makes it worse, "because you're
trying to justify it" instead of addressing their real point!
Do you know what I mean? haven't you seen this over and over?
Thank you for your thoughtful reply. Unfortunately it's like presenting
an entire banquet to guests who refuse the invitation
because they prefer to find fault with the cook!
No matter how delicious the meal is, they aren't going to eat.
It's more important to make a political statement, even if it
doesn't actually apply to that cook or their cuisine. Doesn't matter.
If that cook "symbolizes" what is wrong, then protesting that cook
is protesting that wrong thing. And refusing to eat their food publicizes this.
Appealing to their sense of reason just offends them more.
That is like attacking their judgment, and makes them cling
MORE defensively to their decision to boycott.
I think you know what I mean.
Especially if it doesn't apply to this book,
that shows even more that the reaction is based on "symbolism not substance."
