Through Jaundiced Eyes
The protestors stood in the dark. The only illumination was from what was left of the burning rubble of literacy they refused to allow the children to read. I watched the smoke curl up from the ashes of accomplishment. It started this afternoon at 4:30. It began to unfold as they stormed the front of school house. Arms full of books and cans full of fuel. I was dumbfounded, frozen in place as I watched.
I simply cannot understand such an alien, utterly bizarre mindset. Just about everything on earth rouses the holy ire and outrage of fundamentalists book burners. Everything they don't understand, everything outside their narrow little circle, which means just about anything you can think of, is evil and Satanic in their jaundiced eyes.
These protesters, who are not parents of children in this school are denouncing this community as a den of iniquity, why they don't even live in this school district, or even in this state. In fact, I found out later, the two rabble rousers who instigated this war of the words are a Texas couple who run a well-organized and bottomless-pocketed book-banning organization that has a devoted following among fundamentalists.
Our school district has policies in place if ever a book is challenged. They’ve never had to memorize the policy. A book has never been challenged. A parent must fill out a complaint form. No one else has a right to complain - and the book must stay on the curriculum or the library shelves until it has been reviewed by a committee.
Time after time, I have since read, bigger school districts are yielding in the most cowardly and craven manner to fundamentalist bullying, withdrawing the books immediately, and sometimes summarily dismissing the teachers who used the offending books in their classes. When parents complain, the school will offer them the option of letting their children read an alternate book, but the fundamentalists rarely accept any compromise. They don't just want their children reading "Satanic" books, they don't want anyone to read them!
In fact, in Warsaw County, Indiana, the school board simply handed the disputed books over to the protesters, who then publicly burned them, which brings me to where I am today watching, in perplexed fascination. One minute, doing the business this town brought me here to do, the next minute frozen to this place in time.
I am pondering over the question in my head whether parents really have an absolute right to instill their children with such frighteningly hateful, bigoted and backward attitudes?
As adults we have a right to believe as we choose, however outlandish and flat-out wrong our beliefs may be. But when adults seek to trap their (and everyone else's) children in a bizarre world of darkness, hatred, blind fear and anti-intellectualism, it seems to me to be a very perverted use of parental rights, let alone Constitutional Rights.
To quote Annie Kinsella from the movie Field of Dreams, "They're talking about banning books again! Really subversive books, like "The Wizard of Oz" and "The Diary of Anne Frank".... This is the kind of censorship they had under Stalin!.... Who wants to spit on the Constitution? Who thinks the Bill of Rights is a pretty darn good thing?... All right America - I love ya!"
tjs© February 4, 2008
The 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990–2000
I think you might be as surprised as I was!
This is an excellent article you have written. The differences between schools and parents has become wider and wider over the years. When I was in school there wasn't such a difference of opinion (both my parents were teachers) of course when I was in school teachers were allowed to spank us! LOL
ReplyDeleteI think people don't conform as easily as they use to...just a thought
A truly excellent read. Give them an inch ... and the mind censors will run with it. Just remember how PC started ... telling people what they could say and how they could say it ... and all in the framework of being considerate and kind to people less fortunate. Let them in the door and very soon you are being shushed over quite innocent remarks, and people are whispering things like, "You can't say that." You can't say that isn't too far from you can't think that.
ReplyDeleteNow in Christian countries we have Christmas banned in lots of areas in case we offend people of other religions! And it isn't the other religions who are propogating this. Where does it all stop .... if we give them an inch?
Sorry ... this article touched a nerve.
I still make a proud speech that our school still says Merry Christmas and ain't ashamed to say it. Truly sad when they forget what our country was founded on. An excellent piece of how people with little minds try to influence everything we do.
ReplyDeleteI am happy to read this as disturbing as it is. I have no idea what poisons these little peoples minds.... I do believe it is their need to follow a group in which they identfy with. The leader of the group is sick and small... but these people are smaller. very nice blog.
ReplyDeleteThese narrow minded people who live their lives with blinders on, would like to force all of us to live by their rules and belief systems. This is exactly why I refuse to vote for anyone who has the support of these radical, fundamentalist religious groups. They truly are dangerous and pose a very real threat to our basic freedoms.
ReplyDeleteWonderfully written ~ easy to see your passion in this one!!!
ReplyDeleteCouldn't agree with it more!!! Super Write!
Excellent article.... to quote from Lemony Snicket... "Don't underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups."
ReplyDeleteI have taught books once banned and identify with the essay. In Farenheit 451 the fire chief chides Montag, telling him books upset people. I have seen the list of banned books and rather like a lot of them. No wonder Huck Finn ran away at the end of the book to get away from the narrow minded.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, people try to perpetuate their own narrow mindsets, their disturbingly shallow view of the world, bringing up the next generation of ignorant bigots. You can get a license to drive, to hunt, to shoot a gun, but you don't have to be licensed to be a parent, the most important job on earth.
ReplyDelete