Jonah Goldberg wrote a column for USA Today on September 5, 2011 calling Banned Books Week merely ‘hype’ and ‘propaganda’.
He puts forth lots of statements like the fact that bookse can’t be legally banned and complains that the American Library Association is aggrandizing the apparently non-issue of bok banning. The ALA highlights any issue of books being removed (or requested to be removed) from library shelves. He says this is highlighting ‘a stupid decision by one school somewhere in American and hype the anecdote as a trend.’ (Check out the ALA website for more information.)
Now, a parent ‘complains that your 8-year-old should be reading a book with lots of sex, violence or profanity until he or she is a little older’ when there is a legitimate problem, and of course, there are plenty of books that require a mature reader. But, I think this is an issue of curriculum planning and parenting, not of having books on shelves.
A "banned" book is a book that has been removed from a public library or school's shelves or reading lists due to pressure from someone who isn't a librarian or teacher. In practice, this means pretty much any book that's pulled off the shelves of a library can be counted as "banned." …Moreover, it's crazy. If the mere absence of a book counts as a "ban," then 99.99% of books have been banned somewhere.
This statement is just inflammatory for no reason. The ALA is not saying that any book that is literally removed from a shelf is banned; these are issues of parents or community members challenging a book, requesting it to be removed from a library’s collection, and making it unavailable to the public being served by the school or library. In fact, Mr. Goldberg, the ALA would support books being removed from shelves on a daily basis, because that means books are being borrowed, shared, and read.
The issue that is being highlighted by the ALA and Banned Books Week is that there are still books being pulled off of shelves because their morals or content seem inappropriate. I will say again that obviously there are books not appropriate for all ages, but I posit that this does not mean they should be pulled out of libraries altogether. If a book requires a certain maturity level, then it should be in curriculum for an appropriate age group, clearly. And, if a child is not ready to read it, but chooses it off the shelf, a teacher or parent has the right to suggest otherwise and explain that they should wait.
This is a similar issue to one that I wrote about on January 6 when the n-word was removed from a new printing of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Go check that out for my argument.
This is really a freedom of information issue. I will say again, not all books are appropriate for all ages. But, whose job is it to tell me or my parents or my teachers what books should be completely removed from a library’s collection? Teachers and parents are supposed to help kids decide what to read, but not decide for an entire group (whether that be a school or a community) what is available.
I guess it comes down to the fact that regardless of whether or not I want to read a book or think that a certain kid should read a certain book, I don’t think anyone else should have a say about it. I like making my own choices and I like to be able to choose not to do something without someone telling me that I can’t. But maybe that’s just me.