Book Banning

http://ncacblog.wordpress.com/2009/06/19/hemingway-king-sedaris-kicked-out-of-new-hampshire-high-school-classes/

Boo to that school in Litchfield, New Hampshire for banning "Hills Like What Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway because its central character is a young woman who is about to get an abortion; "Survivor Type" by Stephen King because it involves self-cannibalism; and "I Like Guys" by David Sedaris because ... well, the title speaks for itself.

Puritanical blowhards.

"Oh, but think about the children!"

What about them? Give me a break. The minds of your high schoolers are far less fragile than you think. These short stories won't destroy their lives. (Although perhaps the Sedaris story will provide struggling gay and lesbian teens a sense of comfort, and we can't have THAT, right?).

I don't know about the lives of the convicts in Rahway or San Quentin or wherever, but I highly doubt that ANY of their biographies will say something like:

"He was raised by a loving family, helped out in the community, and got good grades in school ... until the day he read 'Hills Like White Elephants'. That's when the hard drugs, robberies, rapes and murders started."

Furthermore, as long as you're banning books involving violent stuff, there's one book I read recently which was rather gruesome. I'll include a passage:

"And Moses said unto them, Have ye saved all the women alive? Behold, these caused the children of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to commit trespass against the Lord in the matter of Peor, and there was a plague among the congregation of the Lord. Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves."

Creepy work. And I thought the Marquis de Sade penned some depraved shit.