Recently I was going to the local library website to renew some books, or some other similar task. I noticed a blurb discussing Banned Book Week. I decided to look at the list mentioned of banned books. Some of what I saw on that list has been bothering me ever since.
Let me start by saying that I am opposed to banning books. I firmly believe in the importance of the First Amendment. I am enough of a writer, and certainly enough of a reader, to dislike the idea of books being banned. Not to mention that my time in the former East Germany, even though it was after the unification, greatly strengthened my awareness of the consequences of the lack of free speech and the danger of banning books. So I support the ideals of the American Library Association.
Here's the problem. When I actually started looking at the list of "Banned and Challenged Classics" and the list of the past year's challenged books, I discovered that a large percentage of these "challenges" were not attempts to remove a book from a library or restrict access to it, but rather were requests to remove a book from a school "Required Reading" list. To me, this is a completely different question. The ALA's "Library Bill of Rights" includes the following: “Librarians and governing bodies should maintain that parents—and only parents—have the right and the responsibility to restrict the access of their children—and only their children—to library resources.” If a teacher can require my child to read a given book, and if they do not read the book their grade is adversely affected, then I, as a parent, no longer have the right to restrict my child's access to that book. I am now being prevented from fulfilling my responsibilities as a parent. No institution or individual should have the right to require that children (or anyone) read books that their parents, or the children themselves, feel would be harmful to them
If the thought is that removing a book from the required list is akin to restricting access to it because no one will read a book that isn't assigned, well, that's a condemnation of the values of our society, and the solution is to find ways to not kill interest in reading in children, NOT to require them to read certain books.
As a side note, I also want to state that while I believe that too much required reading can kill a love of reading for children, I do recognize that there are books I read because I was required to in school that were important to be read. Many of them I did not like, but I can see the value in having read them. On the other hand, some of the books I was required to read had little to teach me other than recognizing that just because a bunch of "experts" say a book is great doesn't mean it has any value to me.
One final note: I also have to mention that Banned Books Week is also good for reminding us of things as silly as Christian groups trying to ban
The Lord of the Rings because it is "Satanic".
