Sultan: When history is banned from schools

[Nevilledog]

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Tweet text:
Aisha Sultan
@AishaS
Lawmakers can ban ideas & censor books by writers like @nhannahjones and @DrIbram, but that doesn't mean they will stop kids from reading about them. This censorship makes me wonder if they've ever met any kids lately.

Sultan: When history is banned from schools
The most recent swell of censorship has a pernicious twist.
stltoday.com
7:02 AM · Oct 29, 2021

No paywall
https://archive.ph/Gwntv

My favorite book in elementary school was about a life-altering friendship between two fifth-graders who created an imaginary world in the woods to escape their day-to-day troubles.

“Bridge to Terabithia” by Katherine Paterson won the Newbery Medal in 1978, an honor awarded to the most distinguished children’s books. Generations of readers made it a beloved classic. It was also one of the most frequently challenged books targeted for removal from libraries and schools through the ‘90s and early 2000s. Adults objected to offensive language, a character’s use of “Lord” outside of prayer and claimed the book promoted witchcraft and violence. The Hartford Courant reported in 2002 that residents petitioned the school board to ban the book to “eliminate the study of materials containing information about witchcraft, magic, evil spells, or related material now and forever. We believe this material is satanic, a danger to our children, is being studied excessively, and has no place in our schools.”

Paterson is the child of Christian missionaries, spent time as a missionary herself and married a Presbyterian minister.

Details, details.

People have found reasons to get worked up about certain kinds of books for longer than anyone reading this has been alive.

The most recent swell of censorship, however, has a pernicious twist.

*snip*

[paleotn]

1. Simple minded "solutions" from black and white people...

They're incapable of understanding nuance or complexity. They're brains simply aren't wired that way. Thus, their children do what they tell them not to do, watch and read what they ban and for the life of them, they can't figure out why their kids do that.

[CanonRay]

2. How do you expect to ban things

when literally everything is on the internet? Seems a fools errand to me.