Someone told me America was a place to express your ideas. But really we want to all be the same.

I was going to post something else today, but I read Cheryl Rainfield’s blog on Tuesday and it’s been eating at me.  Her book, Scars, has been on my To Read list for a while because to be honest, there just aren’t that many books out there like it.  It’s the story of a teenage girl, sexually abused and stalked, who finds control over her situation by cutting herself.  Along the way, she falls in love with another girl.  I’ve heard a lot of really good things about the book.

I can also see where it could be controversial.

There are a lot of viewpoints in the world today.  You might be a right-wing loyalist, a tea party fanatic, or religiously adherent.  I make no apology for being conservative in my views – but I also understand that you don’t believe the same things I do.  And that’s okay.

Did you read that last thing?

It’s okay for people to believe differently.  To want to read different things.  Because we were all raised differently.  We have different needs, wants, desires, fears and not all of our baggage is Gucci.

It upsets me that a public library would be pressured to remove a book by people who have probably never read it.  Someone with too much time on their hands probably flipped it open, read the jacket and went screaming to another person.  I’d like to know how many of those people asking for the book to be removed have read it, or are just judging it by the cover.  I can understand high school libraries removing books that are of questionable content, but not a public library.

There’s a lot I could say about why Scars being removed from the public library upsets me.  I could talk about my own traumatic times as a teenager.  I could point out how a book like that might be the only therapy a teen could ever experience.  But I can’t seem to put it in words.  Maybe I’m too close to the topic at heart, so I apologize if I come off as a raving, drum beating crazy lady.

This is America.  Where we’re supposed to have freedom of speech and press.  We’re supposed to be the melting pot of the world.  But we’re afraid of a book.  An idea.  Part of me wants to ask those requesting the ban, Why are you so insecure that a fictitious story captured in black and white text scares you?  What happened to you that this threatens you so much?

When I wrote this up I asked myself all the necessary questions I wrote about in my Bad Blogging post, and then I started to listen to the slam poet, Bradly Hathaway.  He has a piece about what it means to be ‘hardcore’ that says…

Somebody told me hardcore was a place to share what you believe, but I didn’t like what dude said, so I flipped him off and told him to leave.

That’s kind of how I feel like we’re acting.  We see something, a book in this case, that we don’t like and it must be wrong, bad, or something else so we ban it, we speak out against it, and we seperate ourselves from what we say is ‘bad’ and in doing so we cut out bits and pieces of who we are.  Ideas can be dangerous, they can create revolution, inspire love, or craft a beautiful letter.  The written words on a page in the end only matter to you if you read them, and no one is forcing you to read them.  You have to chose to.  At least here in America you have that freedom.

I’m sad and upset that people can be so short-sighted.

Every year the American Library Association hosts a Banned Books Week in late September.  They also keep tabs on what books are being banned, and how often.  It’s a ways off, but I’d like to encourage you to scroll through the lists and see what books and authors are being banned.  It might surprise you to see what’s on there.

Here’s a quick list from skimming the top ten books banned each year.  These are books I am familiar with. 

• To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
• Twilight (series) by Stephenie Meyer
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain
• Harry Potter (series), by J.K. Rowling 
• Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, by Mildred D. Taylor

To Kill A Mockingbird, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry are all books I read in school growing up.  Are they at times uncomfortable to read because they introduce ideas of racism and violence?  Yes, but those are part of our world.  Twilight, I might not care for it, but I’ve never seen the books cause physical injury.  The Harry Potter series breathed a huge breath of fresh air into Middle Grade and YA publishing.  Yes, it’s dark at times, but what I’ve read of it there isn’t needless violence or a mandate to sacrifice your neighbors new born kittens in the margins.

Click through the list of banned books and the authors.  Do you see an author you know?  Are you surprised by it?