Open Your Mind to a Banned Book
The 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990–1999 List contains some of the best literature in the English language. Number 10, The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger); number 40, To Kill a Mocking Bird (Harper Lee); number 45, Beloved (Toni Morrison); number 51, A Light in the Attic (Shel Silverstein); number 67, Slaughterhouse-Five (Kurt Vonnegut); number 68, Lord of the Flies (William Golding); and number 69, Native Son (Richard Wright) are some of the best books I've ever read.
I don't understand why parents and educators alike, find such books as these offensive or crude. The situations that are written about, that the characters in these books go through, are the same situations that people deal with in real life -- they aren't situations created by an overactive imagination.
Often I feel as if I'll never understand some people. They don't like their children reading about racism, yet it's okay for their kids to go to school and experience it first hand. Talk of sex makes parents cringe, therefore anything dealing with any type of sexual interaction between characters is a no-no. I'm willing to bet that the same kind of parents have no idea that their children are sexually active.
If Jesus isn't walking on water, yelling out that J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series are okay, even with their focus on wizardry and magic, most adults (and kids) will never be able to accept such books.
That is one of the saddest facts I've ever had to learn.
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