http://patch.com/virginia/burke/book-banning-hits-eastern-shore-school-district-virginia
When will they ever learn?
Never.
Children must be forever in bubbles because they’re never going to encounter any of these words or ideas! 8-|
This is stupid, I am sorry. I understand the sensitivity, but it is a classic case of someone trying to ban a book without understanding it. The point of books like Huck Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird was to lay bare the ugliness of racism and the attitudes people had, and in Huck Finn probably the most noble character is that of Jim, while the whites in the book are shown for what they really are, same with To Kill a Mockingbird. The Merchant of Venice shows anti semitism at its ugliest, which is part of its point whether Shakespeare intended it or not. Instead of banning the books, maybe the parent who complained should read the book themselves, because if they did they could talk to the kid and make him understand what it was about. This is as bad as the religious right trying to ban Harry Potter or Catcher in the Rye because it ‘offends the moral sensitivity’ of their kids, or worse when they ban books based merely on the title, and it turns out the content was innocuous.
Book banning whether to soothe the feelings of a group that has felt left out or because of religious beliefs or because they don’t like the idea of the book (like banning a book like “the Unknown American Revolution” because it bursts more than a few myths about the revolutionary period), in the end it is trying to control what kids (or adults) are exposed to and to control ideas and thoughts as well.
Proud to say…20 years ago I got a book removed from our elementary school library!
“Curious George and the Dinosaur!!” In this book, the museum field trip became boring until George climbed on a dinosaur skeleton’s bones. The children cheered! George SHOULD have been spanked. What was the author thinking?? The principal disagreed with me, but I volunteered in the library and the book appeared to have been removed from the shelves from that time forward…
Fast forward to today and I am even more concerned about the thoughts and ideas my young adults are being fed on college campuses.
Yes. How dare adults be exposed to different ideas!
But seriously- you had a Curious George book removed? Good grief. And people accuse my generation of being over-sensitive snowflakes.
^^ Would you have also tried to ban “Bi-Curious George”?
@ksm you are pulling our leg right?
Re: #3
Was the objection to that book based on the idea that museums usually frown on visitors climbing on the displays?
I think kids who are exposed to Curious George books become anarchists. :(|) 
@ucbalumnus:
I think it was on the lines of when they banned comic books in the 1950’s, how they taught young people socially disrespectful behavior and turned them into reprobates like in the “Wild Ones”…or claimed that Road Runner was gonna get kids to drop anvils on people’s heads and so forth from watching those cartoons (hint, watched many hours of them, never felt inclined to drop an anvil on the road runner or order and unleash an instant tornado) lol
Honestly, they should ban that faux Harper Lee novel “Go set a watchman”. It’s more about elder abuse and a scummy lawyer taking over her estate than anything else.
P.S. Since the same lawyer has prohibited “To Kill a Mockingbird” from being printed as a mass market paperback, it will be disappearing as a school reader anyway.
Really? Really? What part of To Kill a Mockingbird even remotely condones or suggests using the n- word is okay? The ignorance is just stunning.
Well, you can just guess how my avatar and I feel about this!
@calicash yup. And Beloved (the book challenged in my high school) condones rape and infanticide.
@ksm @veruca @romanigypsyeyes I am very sure he speaks in jest. :)) Nobody would be offended by a little mischievous monkey.
If I were going to ban something because of bad child behavior it would be the TV show Caliou - I really disliked that kid
"To Kill a Mockingbird " is such a special book. It is not subtle -I can’t imagine that anyone who read it wouldn’t get the point. Maybe the book banner didn’t read it? I feel sorry for her children.
@musicprnt I always wished I could pick up the phone and call ACME and have something delivered as soon as I hung up the phone. I didn’t want an anvil though. I loved those cartoons -but confess I was an adult before I understood that an anvil was a real thing that had a purpose other than Coyote/Roadrunner warfare.
I would b interested in the opinion of the parent of a black or biracial child about the experience of reading those books. Of that of a black or biracial parent who experienced it themselves.
Thank goodness that principal could distinguish between the intellectual capacity of a human child vs. a chimp.
@MaelstromMonkey With that moniker, you’re just the perfect person to make that comment. 
Only tangentially related: I had an extra credit question on one of my bio anthro tests in undergrad asking what type of primate Curious George was. We had to justify it using physical characteristics. I don’t remember what my answer was but the prof gave us credit as long as we correctly argued our point. The consensus was though that he doesn’t fit nicely into in any “real” category of primate. (Though “monkey” was definitely wrong since he doesn’t have a tail… unless he had a horrible accident. Which was, by the way, an acceptable part of the answer lol.)