Book Banning by Any Other Name Would Still Be Censorship
'The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.' – Albert Camus
Ah yes, Albert Camus, winner of the Nobel Peace
Prize in 1957 . . .
Two things happened to me recently that have brought the subject of book banning actively into my thoughts. The first thing happened when I read an article in the School Library Journal about a woman whose school visit was canceled due to a parent’s objection to her subject matter. The article is geared toward authors and is mostly about how she recovered the loss of income from the cancellation. She follows up with suggestions for authors who may find themselves in the same position.
The aspect of the article that commanded my attention, however, especially as we purposefully spotlight Banned Book Week, was the power of one person to impose her beliefs upon a community of educators and children and their parents. The subject of the school visit concerned a nonbinary snail, which truth be told, is the condition of most snails, worms, and even trees. This is science. And if you’re religious, these are God’s doings. No room for argument, I would think. But because this parent found such a notion objectionable, (may I add, putting her ignorance on public display as well), the principal of the school caved in to her demands and elected to not expose his school to the inevitable ugly battle she was instigating. Consequently, ALL the children of that school missed out on the opportunity to learn something about the natural world. One person whose sensibilities were offended impeded access to knowledge for everyone else. In its essence, isn’t this what book banning is? Censorship—the suppression of ideas and information?
The next thing that happened was my recent ramble through a local Barnes & Noble. I was having a grand time admiring the endless variety of reading options for adults and children when I found myself in the children’s section, unquestionably my favorite. There I came across an endcap designed by a staff member featuring books, many of them classics, that had been banned by schools or libraries over the years. Beneath each book the reason for banishment was listed.
Well, I was gobsmacked - and embarrassed! Here I am a children’s book author but living as if I’m on another planet. In my defense, though I don’t really deserve one, it’s not that I’ve been unaware of book banning. Of course, all my reading life I’ve been aware of the adult titles that put someone’s nose out of joint. I’m familiar with Nazi Germany. But for younger audiences, I thought the books most affected were the titles written for upper elementary and middle school grades when the “age of innocence” starts to fall away with the accumulation of birthdays. What I did not realize is that over the years, picture books have been affected as well. My reaction to seeing this endcap with some of the classics on it was, initially, disbelief . . .
Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss – banned for “encouraging children to use violence against fathers”
Where The Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak – banned for “being traumatizing to kids due to Max’s inability to control his emotions”
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein – banned for “sexist content (the tree loves a boy)”
I want to argue with each one of these reasons, because I think they are ridiculous – my opinion. Everyone’s entitled to one. And here’s the crux of this issue - does my opinion weigh more than anyone else’s? And contrarily why should someone else’s opinion dictate to me what I can and cannot read? The very idea makes me stand up straighter, puff out my chest, and say, “Oh yeah?”
I had to know more. I’m a research-y kind of gal, so I dove into it. I soon found myself not in the weeds, not in a marshy swampland, but in a muddy bog. Book burning/banning has gone on for centuries, and I made the mistake of going back into history too far. For example: reading about Nazi Germany and the book burning that occurred during that era was fascinating for a raw, overall understanding as to why book banning occurs in various cultures and time periods. But from what I’ve been able to glean, most of the books thrown on those bon fires nearly one hundred years ago were adult books written by philosophers and scientists, intellectuals and free thinkers. Additionally, I learned that books were not burned in a wholesale conflagration. Many books were “sorted and stored” - locked away from the general public and read only by trusted individuals and scholars whose status deemed them worthy. It was a deplorable campaign and a relatively minor one in comparison to the overall scheme of genocide and extermination of “undesirables” exercised by the Nazi Germany during that era, but it is an example and valuable reminder of what a government can do while under the direction of certain individuals attempting to strip freedom from its citizens.
However, like I said, while all of this is immensely interesting it’s a topic of gargantuan proportions, so I had to narrow my focus, because what I really want to talk about are the attempts to ban children’s books in this country today. An expansive topic, it is made more complex by the numerous entities involved: public schools and libraries and their boards of trustees—institutions that are expected to operate within the parameters of a given culture’s values and shared history, geographical location and socioeconomic status—the expressions of the communities in which they reside.
It’s no surprise there have been times of discord and disagreement given the unique heritage of the United States. Its tremendous size combined with a myriad of diverse happenings that have occurred in its three-hundred-year history have sculpted attitudes that are quite literally foundational and differ from one community to the next. However, regardless of what has shaped these communities, no individual or group has the right to dictate for anyone else’s children what they can and cannot read, which brings me full circle to the story I began this blog with:
“While a parent has the right to guide their own children’s reading, their beliefs and prejudices should not dictate what another parent chooses for their own children.”
This quote comes from an excellent article in the American Library Association website written earlier this year. I highly recommend it.
