As John Stossel would say, “Wake up America!” Our rights are being taken from us every time we turn around and it’s up to us to realize this and make the change. People are becoming weak to words and just falling back with no fight, finding comfort in just conforming with the popular opinion. America’s youth is growing up in a completely controlled society with biased opinions and we need to wake up!
Oversensitivity is a reoccurring problem with America today. In John Stossel’s “Censored in America”, he discusses how some colleges offer “safe spaces” for people who are feeling uncomfortable or offended. People, instead of debating head on with their oppressors, go to a room where they can “recuperate” from the “trauma”. When colleges provide
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Teachers of public education are restricted to certain books they must cover or are not allowed to use. Most of these books are satirical and received bad reviews when first published, mainly to sway people from reading them, but are considered some of America’s greatest literary works now. The Grapes of Wrath, for example, was banned in 1939 because of profanity and references to sexual behavior. The Grapes of Wrath, however, tells the tale of the Dust Bowl and how poorly the government treated its citizens. Exhibit B is The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, banned in 1884 for being “racially insensitive” and “oppressive”. The satirical effect here was how wrong America was for capturing and trying to possess another human being. Both books were pointing out fallacies in the government and both happened to be on the list of banned school reading materials. Banning books not only limits what teachers may teach in their classrooms, but also is violating the author’s right to their free speech as well. The school, state, or federal government is declaring that what the authors wrote is not allowed to be seen by America’s youth, taking from their free speech, but also violating the youth’s rights to an unbiased education. America’s leaders only want us to read and learn what they see fit. Times have changed and they’re stuck in their
It’s appalling that the issue of schools banning books from students is still an ever present issue to this present day. Fact of the matter is, comfort is being prioritized over education. The school boards and their staff are rejecting truth because it contains inappropriate topics such as nudity, violence, and derogatory vocabulary. Katz and Vishny write how the Tennessee education board states these exact topics to their reason for why they chose to ban Maus. The school board's reasoning is how it is determined that they choose to prioritize comfort for the students.
United States of America, a country that is known for its striving democracy and its amendment towards “freedom of speech”, made an unlawful decision by allowing many public places like libraries and schools to apply censorship and ban books. Literature and any other type of writing are all types of freedom of speech because it allows each author to express themselves and their message through their work. With the authority of censorship and banning of books in a democracy like the United States causes a danger to us because we would not have the ability to obtain certain knowledge that might help us in a significant way. Additionally, I think we would be affected if we did not read any of the short stories we read in class, for example, “Battle Royal” by Ralph Ellison. If we had not read “Battle Royal, we would never have the chance to unscramble and understand his symbolism in his
Book banning is not as common as it is made out to be in the U.S., but it does put a restriction the constitution’s first amendment. To ban a book, in the U.S., from a public or school libraries, for offensive content, a challenge must be made against the book. A challenge can be made by anyone but of the challenges made between “1990 and 2000, there were 6,364 challenges reported... sixty percent were reported by parents, fifteen percent by patrons and nine percent by administrators” (Schools and censorship: Banned Books). Most of these challenges sent to the American Library Association do not get accepted and officially ban the book.
Recently, many people have forgotten why the United States of America was formed, for freedom and independence from a king and state. Some of us even have trouble remembering what rights we do have, due to the gradual but continuous media and educational focus on more current distractions. Few have taken notice, or been able to see through the daily fog of which Iphone to buy or what flag offends who. There is still discrimination everywhere we look being race, body type, the religion we follow. More and more police are being caught on camera shooting unarmed citizens, throwing bombs into cribs during no-knock, warrantless entries, and causing the general public to lose faith in a system of governance originally set up to protect and serve.
Today’s college students are becoming more sensitized to the harshness of the outside world. Instead of learning to be resilient to others’ comments, they are being taught to take offense to any little word that could in some way be connected with a bad experience they might have had, and college administrators and professors are aiding this childish behavior. They are backing this movement to make adults into children. With this new movement to rid college campuses of any speech that may make anyone feel uncomfortable, students are being treated less like adults, and more like elementary children.
American literature has always been a form of entertainment and education. When slaves were introduced as characters in books, they were always negative, stereotypical characters, but not until 1883 when Mark Twain wrote The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was a change made. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a book about a southern white boy in the 1800’s that runs away with an escaped slave on the Mississippi River. For years, schools have been debating on if the book should be banned in schools or not, and it is already on a variety of banned lists. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn should not be banned in schools because it is an anti-slavery novel that teaches students valuable lessons and informs students of the past culture.
In the 21st century, many books are challenged and banned for their content, some of these include The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Animal Farm, and Fahrenheit 451. Many of the reasons given for banning are the same. The reasons include violence, language, symbols, and religion. This makes it very difficult for educational professionals; which books should be taught and which ones should be banned, when does protection become unnecessary censorship? Although Fahrenheit 451 shows some dark themes such as banning books, disregard for human life, and suicide, it should be included in the school curriculum because it shows the dystopian future that awaits the world if the events in the book become a reality.
Books can create portals to different life experiences and encourage reading. A few schools and libraries have challenged the educational value of some books, however, therefore leading them to eventually be prohibited in a particular place. Each reason may be different depending on the book and the location of the exclusions. Books are icons of literature and their value should outshine the occasionally offensive topic. Be that as it may, there are multiple reasons why books should be taught and included in a curriculum.
Ironically, Fahrenheit 451 is one of the most banned books in American schools. The book was seen as evil for ideas like opposing the suppression of freedom by parties that presumed they had all the answers. Books such as Fahrenheit 451, 1984, Brave New World, The Giver, and The Hunger Games have been banned in schools, and they all explore the themes of suppressing freedom, information, and intellectual thinking. Prohibiting these books will only lead less thought; it will lead to the ultimate demise of society. If we do not learn from them, we will become them.
Just because a book that was written many decades ago may have bad words in it, doesn’t mean that it should be withheld from the students. Additionally, the educational value of, The Catcher in the Rye would be totally lost if a book is banned just for containing “explicit” language. Sophomore students are at the age where they are old enough to know what is appropriate and what isn’t and they can read a book that has bad words in it. If a book is banned because of its explicit content, that overshadows the educational content and the moral lessons that the reader would take away from reading this book.
Now, we aren’t as serious as they are in the book about reading and censorship, but now parents are complaining about books like Of Mice and Men, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, because of the language that is used. People need to read these books, so that they learn the history, and it should make them uncomfortable because it was not a good time in history and they need to learn about how racist and terrible it was for some
At one point in time, over 7,220 books have been challenged to be banned. Though these books have been removed for the safety of children, not all books should be banned for many reasons. These include the fact that banning books is infringing on the First Amendment, keeping children from understanding the real world, and, even though there are many reasons for book banning, not banning books could help a student’s education and can even work against itself. Banning a book from a school or public library could go against a person’s First Amendment of the freedom of press.
Some school districts have banned Fahrenheit 451 from
Every child deserves a proper education. Banned books are depriving students of a well rounded, culturally aware, literary education because of the culture that is discarded, the history that is being withheld, and the education that young people could get through these banned books. The point of history is to learn from it and learn from others mistakes, but how can we do that if we are not allowed to learn it. As teachers shouldn’t you be teaching us how to make judgment calls like understanding that Mark Twain was a racist, but a man of his time and that doesn’t change him being an amazing writer. We cannot learn things such as that if we cannot even read most of Mark Twain’s books.
Also, some say that you should not be exposing bad behavior or language to students but in reality they hear and see these things everyday, and by banning a book, that is not protecting them. Writers have the freedom to write whatever they want and that is a part of the First Amendment, so why banned their book? “The First Amendment allows individuals to speak, publish, read and view what they wish, worship (or not worship) as they wish, associate with