Saturday, September 25, 2010

Banned Books Week

Celebrate the Freedom to Read! Go read a banned or challenged book! Open your mind.

Honestly, some of the reasons for challenging books are just ridiculous and petty. Others come from people who have never even read the books but jumped to snap conclusions.

According to the ALA,
"Often challenges are motivated by a desire to protect children from “inappropriate” sexual content or “offensive” language. The following were the top three reasons cited for challenging materials as reported to the Office of Intellectual Freedom:

1. The material was considered to be "sexually explicit"
2. The material contained "offensive language"
3. The material was "unsuited to any age group"'

But it's my job as a parent to protect my child. It's my job to look at anything questionable and decide if I want her to be reading it. But it is NOT my job to police other children's reading. And it's not your job either.

I read plenty of things that I'm sure my mother would have had fits about had she known. As a pre-teen I read "Forever" by Judy Blume (my mother knew the author's name, but not the subject of the book, and needless to say I never shared that with her!) and found in a stack of my older sister's college books the story of Linda Lovelace. I can't say I would want my daughter to read the Lovelace book right now, but they didn't turn me into to some twisted sex fiend ;)

For me.

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