It was easy for me to find books to read with my daughter when she was younger. She loved Junie B. Jones books and I did too. Who wouldn’t love the quirky little girl character and her fabulous summaries of events? “And that’s all.”
But finding books to read with my son when he was younger was a little bit more challenging. Believe it or not, books about robots, dragons, magic treehouses and Star Wars characters put me to sleep. Falling asleep while he’s doing it isn’t exactly a good way to help teach your child to read. Then we found Captain Underpants. I was quite taken with mischievous George Beard and Harold Hutchins and their superhero principal. I also apparently take to characters with catch phrases. “Tra-la-laaa!”
Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the Captain Underpants series by Dav Pilkey has been challenged repeatedly to the Office for Intellectual Freedom. Apparently the books include “offensive language” and are “unsuited for the age group” to which they are targeted. Huh? I must have missed that. My son loved them too. I certainly would not have read anything with him that I found unsuitable.
Maybe the issue actually is that I’m unsuitable? I mean, I recently read John Green’s Looking for Alaska at the same time that my 14-year-old daughter read it. We both loved the book, which was challenged as including “offensive language,” and being “sexually explicit” and “unsuited for age group.” I’m sure my daughter was offended by the language in the book. I’m also certain that she was uninformed about sex (which didn’t actually happen in the book) and death or suicide before reading it. I hope you read my sarcasm in those last two sentences.
But, again, I’m apparently unsuitable. I mean The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is one of my favorite books. I encouraged my daughter to read it as well. Yes, I realized it contained profanity and references to sex and homosexuality. But so does her real life, so I wasn’t too concerned.
I also liked the challenged book Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher and encouraged my daughter to read it. True, the book makes references to drugs, alcohol, smoking, sex, and suicide, but, again, so does life at my daughter’s high school, so it seemed just fine to me. Clearly I’m unsuitable, or at least don’t understand what’s acceptable for my child.
To be fair, I read the Fifty Shades of Grey series by E. L. James. I liked the mindless “trash” reading. I actually agree with the challenge that they were “sexually explicit,” but I am a grown woman. For the record, I did not pass those along to my daughter and would not allow her to read them at this age.
I also wouldn’t encourage my daughter to read A Stolen Life by Jaycee Dugard, which I read. It’s difficult to say I enjoyed the book because there’s nothing to enjoy about Jaycee’s real-life story of kidnapping and abuse. I wouldn’t allow my daughter to read it because it would scare her. At the same time, I’m offended that Jaycee’s story was challenged because of “drugs/alcohol/smoking, offensive language, sexually explicit, and unsuited for age group.” These things actually happened to Jaycee after she was kidnapped at 11 years old! You’re challenging her life? That’s just crazy.
Banned Books Week ends today. The week was launched in 1982 in response to the number of challenged to books in schools, bookstores and libraries. You read that right, some people want to limit the books you have access to in bookstores! The week obviously must end, but the fight against censorship has to continue. Hundreds of books are removed or challenged in schools and libraries every year in the U.S. More than 11,300 books have been challenged since 1982, the American Library Association reports. More than 300 books were challenged in 2014, according to the association.
Every book is not for everyone, and that’s ok. But someone else doesn’t get to decide what books are right for my children or me. Those choices are mine (and my husband’s, where the children are concerned) to make. After all, if my teachers had adhered to this list when I was in school, I would not have read classics like The Great Gatsby
Don’t let someone else shape your reading list or that of your children. And please don’t even try to tell others what they can’t read. If you don’t want to read it, don’t read it. If you don’t want your children to read it, don’t allow them to. But censorship never is the answer. It’s the opposite of freedom, which is the foundation of everything we enjoy as Americans.
I, for one, will read banned books. Always.
