Confessions: On Banning Books

Confessions of an Insomniac Book Devourer #10

I have a bit of a personal bone to pick with parents who choose to moderate (and/or stymie) their young adult's reading habits- mostly because I had a male parent (referred to forthwith as the Banner) who was also big on banning books.

When I look back at the books the Banner disapproved of and approved of, it gets confusing. My favorite genre of Fantasy was a regular topic of banning, but so were any books that had made national headlines.

Here are some of Banner-approved books:
The Bible
The Lord of the Rings trilogy
The Chronicles of Narnia

Here are the books the Banner disapproved of:
*Greek Mythology
The Harry Potter series
Anything with witchcraft/magic/non-Christian deities (godless worlds were much preferred)

You'll notice there are some discrepancies- both Narnia and Middle Earth had elements of magic. If you're not a believer in miracles, a lot of the Bible ends up sounding like magic too. This banning never made sense to me, so I never felt bad about reading banned books, and as long as I wasn't caught, it didn't matter to me. *When I was told I had to read Greek Mythology for school, my mother made sure I hid the book and any projects relating to it- the Banner didn't care that his rules interfered with my education, and would've probably pitched a fit (and/or pulled me out of private Catholic school) had he seen me reading it.

That said, I understand some reasons people feel they must ban books: it's difficult to tell which age group should read which book, but often my rule of thumb is the reader should be within two years of the protagonist's age (Ender's Game and adult books N/A). It's also hard for religious parents to find acceptable non-religious reads for their kids and teens in a world where sex sells. Many very innocent-looking YA books I read as a teen ended up having sex in them (without any warnings as to the content). Which is why I always chose fantasy- it was relatively clean of that, if not a tad bit gorey.

But to those parents who ban with very little reason (too violent, too much magic, too real of content, too much fun), I urge you to look at the world we live in. The writers of these banned books are often making a statement about the modern world through a YA book- The Hunger Games details our obsession with reality tv and war, Harry Potter is about perseverance despite people being against us (bullying, teachers being mean), and Speak addresses the statistic that one in six American women have been victims of a rape or attempted rape. It may not be easy to accept that young teens will be adults in the eyes of the law within five years, but they will, and by reading books with difficult subjects at an appropriate age, their transition might be easier.

And also- there's no reason to ban adult books, as long as they're read by adults. I mean really... I'm trying to think of a reason, but I'm not computing. If we as adults are able to vote, shouldn't we be smart enough to choose our own books? **We have freedom of speech- freedom to read should be claused in there somewhere.

**Note: Legalese is not my strong point.

Some of the banned books *gasp* I've read and reviewed on this blog:
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling (MG-YA)
Beloved by Toni Morrison (Adult)
Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell (Adult-ish)
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (Adult)

Also, an interesting study on diversity in banned books- I actually didn't know how many diverse books were a target of banning, brought to my attention by the lovely people of Book Riot:

Book Challenges Suppress Diversity @ Diversity in YA

Have you read any banned books? Do you have a favorite banned book? Are there books you think have crossed the line in terms of content?