Post by men an tol on Dec 4, 2016 1:02:33 GMT -5
The Accomack County Public Schools has banned the classic novels after a mother said her high school-age son was troubled by the racial slurs they contain and asked for the books to be removed from school reading lists. The mother, whose son is biracial, said her son was required to read Huckleberry Finn for a high school assignment, but could not get past a certain page in the story on which the N-word appeared seven times.
“I keep hearing, ‘This is a classic, This is a classic.’ … I understand this is a literature classic. But at some point, I feel that children will not—or do not—truly get the classic part, the literature part, which I’m not disputing,” she argued at a school board meeting. “This is great literature. But there (are so many) racial slurs in there and offensive wording that you can’t get past that.”
“There is other literature they can use,” she argued. The mother proposed assembling a committee of parents and teachers of different ethnic backgrounds to compile a list of books that would be “inclusive” for all students.
This is another one of those things that makes little to no sense. This parent can't protect her son from the realities of history all his life. Why not start breaking him into reality now? He needs to loosen up and shed some of the sensitivity. Starting with these two books the next thing will be banning Gone With the Wind and all books that are set in a time when Slavery was going on.
Parents that are this protective are not doing their kids favors. The school should have refused and referred mother and so to a counselor.
Your comments on this Sysop3 are correct. This is a flat earth approach. Better to have more books of this type and then in the class discuss these issues and maybe the difference in the passing years.