Like many people in the AFA, Mr. Buehrer chooses to look at the words instead of the meaning. In his article Challenging A Book In Your School, Buehrer tries his best to convince us that censorship is not only ok, but should be encouraged. Well, needless to say, he hasn't convinced me. Buehrer starts his article by giving a definition of the word 'censor' so that he can use the wording to find a loophole that would allow him to define every kind of choice a person makes as censorship. Examining a definition just to find a loophole? Bill Clinton would be proud! Let's get something straight right now though, we don't need to look up 'censorship' in order to know what it is. Oral-sex is still a kind of sex, and removing books from schools because you don't like how one word sounds is censorship, NOT just choice. For the sake of argument however, let's go along with Buehrer's analyses of what a censor is. He says (quite accurately) that anyone with power in the school system is a censor because he or she has the power to ban any book. He then claims that "when a parent questions the validity of a book in school, we call it a censorship challenge. But when the teacher does it, we call it part of the job." Again, Buehrer is absolutely right. Now, this situation seems to bother our author and I know why. Mr. Buehrer, like many fundamentalists, seems to think that he knows how to teach children and prepare them for the real world, when in fact, he doesn't really have any desire to prepare children for the real world. Fundamentalists would rather keep their children in a shell of ignorance which they believe will 'protect' them from the real world and from actual knowledge. This may sound a bit harsh, but as we examine Buehrer's article further, we will see that this is truly his intent. Buehrer also seems to think that by not going out of their way to intrude in the workings of the classroom, that parents are saying "I feel that I have a moral obligation to be concerned about what my child sees and reads...except in school; then, anything is acceptable." Give me a break! Reading Catcher in the Rye and reading Nazi propaganda are not the same thing! Buehrer makes it sound like reading a novel with a swear word in it is just as bad as watching hardcore pornography in class. I wonder why Buehrer is SO afraid that children might read something which encourages them to think for themselves?
In the next section, called "So, What is Censorship?", Buehrer tries, rather subtly, to further his blurring of the lines between censorship and selection. He says that "educators shouldn't describe what a parent wants to do in seeking to remove a book as censorship and describe what schools do every day, as selection." Clearly, Buehrer doesn't understand the fundamental differences between selection and censorship. Despite what our author says, censorship is not "the very process of [choosing] one thing over another, sometimes for logical reasons and more often because of personal biases." To choose a book and to ban a book are very different. When a teacher chooses which book she wants her students to read, she isn't 'censoring' the other books. If another teacher wants to use a book she didn't choose, then that is completely within his or her right. Also, if I child wants to read a book in school on his own time which the teacher didn't assign as 'required reading', the teacher won't discourage this. To censor a book is to remove it completely from a school in all forms. That is not choice, that is censorship.
While we are on the topic of What is Censorship?, I think one of the most fundamental things a person needs to look at is the intent of the literature. Just because a books says "Fuck", does not suddenly make it a book which is dangerous. A book which is all about how African Americans are inferior to everyone else however, is just trying to promote hate and prejudice based on nothing but personal ignorance. It's not the words we need to be careful of, it's the meaning of the entire text. If a child hears a swear word, he or she won't suddenly snap and go on a killing spree. Eric Buehrer doesn't seem to understand this.
Not to sound insulting, but Mr. Buehrer's Four Book Selection Guidelines You Can Suggest to Teachers is ridiculous in the extreme. Let's go over each suggestion in detail...
1. Does it violate your
school's handbook on profanity? If a student can't say it in the
halls, why
does he have to read it in the classroom? Look, in the real world
lots of people use foul language,
but if we don't like it we can walk away. In a compulsory
education system with an assigned
reading a student is forced to read it. Why do that? Even if the
book is just on a reading list, you
have to ask yourself, "With 50,000 books published every
year, is this the best stuff we can
recommend?"
I don't think you'll never hear a more obvious case of censorship than the above "suggestion". Buehrer suggests banning any and all books with swear words in them. This is like failing a student on a term paper you haven't read because you don't like how the title sounds. To not read an entire book, no matter how intelligent, educational, or important it is, simply because it uses a swear word has to be the most ignorant and oppressive thing I've ever heard. Buehrer claims that in the real world, we can walk away from swear words, but that isn't true. We can't constantly block our ears every time a swear word is uttered in order to 'protect' our ears. Many people are forced to deal with these words. Words which are used in the REAL world. Yes, it would be nice if we lived in a world where no one swore, but we don't. Instead of pretending we do, we should prepare our children for the world, not keep them ignorant. These words are not things to be feared. As for the statement that "with 50,000 books published every year, is this the best stuff we can recommend?", what if the answer is "yes"? Some of the best, most thought provoking literature contains words which some might find offensive. To judge a book based on the individual words it contains is no worse than judging a person based on the colour of his or her skin or by their religion. I wonder how Mr. Buehrer would feel if a Catholic school banned the Bible for using the word "hell"?
2. Would the teacher read
the book out loud in public? If the book has a sexually explicit
or
gratuitously violent passage that seems so relevant to student
angst or sexual tension, would the
teacher be willing to read it at the next school board meeting or
PTA? Could he give it to a school
board member and ask her to read it out loud? If he thinks it
might be embarrassing maybe he
needs to think twice about letting minors read it. Another
thought: Is the teacher assuming
students are more mature than they really are? They seem
sophisticated in the way they talk
and dress, but they may not be emotionally ready for a certain
book's content.
The problem with this suggestion is that the situation described depends on many things. I mean, some teachers would be more than willing to read passages of gratuitous violence at a PTA meeting, while others wouldn't. It depends on the person, not the material. Second, we need to clarify the age of the students being discussed. If we are talking about students in grade 3 or 4, then I would agree. They're probably a bit too young for certain kinds of literature. If we are talking about High School students however, then I disagree completely. By saying that teachers assume students are more mature than they actually are, Mr. Buehrer is showing a complete lack of respect and understanding for teenagers. Teenagers are more mature and intelligent than people like Buehrer give them credit for. In fact, as long as people like Buehrer continue to view teenagers as "children", the more teenagers will rebel. Respect is the first step towards understanding. Sure, some teenagers are immature, but to generalize like that is the same thing as me saying "All members of the AFA are condescending, ignorant hate-mongers".
3. Does the book represent
the most noble and most inspiring literature students can read?
They'll probably spend most of their lives reading uninspiring
stuff (if they read much at all). Now's
the chance to lift their sights a little higher.
This one is my favourite. I've got to say that this is probably the stupidest thing I've heard in quite a long time. First, as I've mentioned, the role of school is to educate students and to prepare them for life. It is NOT there just to show them pretty pictures of butterflies and say "everything will be completely perfect and nothing will ever happen that is remotely bad". Second, the logic behind the suggestion is horribly flawed. I mean, just because students will have their whole life to do something, doesn't mean they shouldn't start in school. Let's look at some different examples using the same logic:
"Students will spend most of
their lives following the law. Now's the chance for them to live
without rules."
"Students will spend most of their lives working for money.
Now's the chance for them to take things without paying."
"Students will spend most of their lives doing work. Now's
the chance for them to not work at all. Therefore, they should
never do work or get homework."
Need I go on? Just because SOME students MIGHT read ONLY uninspired stuff after school ends, doesn't mean we should force only inspiration literature down their throats, no matter how irrelevant it is to their lives. If a book is intelligent and can be important to a student's life and development, then I think THAT is more important than if it's "uplifting". The story of the Holocaust is not an 'inspiring' one, but does that mean we shouldn't teach our children about it? Is this a lesson we want to teach our kids? If something bad is happening to someone else, then just ignore it because it isn't inspirational? Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it. That includes things which aren't "noble" and "inspiring". Only by educating people can we make sure that these kinds of events never happen again.
4. Is the book the only
one that will teach to the objective? Can the teacher
satisfactorily defend
why he chose the book and rejected (censored) any other
possibilities? Can he reach his
objective with another book and, thus, satisfactorily address
parents' concerns?
Once again, Buehrer shows that he doesn't understand the difference between censorship and choice. Just because a teacher CHOSE one book, doesn't mean she CENSORED the others. To censor a book is to not allow any teacher to use the book for teaching purposes or for students to read it in school. When a teacher chooses one book over another, she is not forcing all teachers in her school board to ignore the books she did not pick. Any other teacher could easily use the book she didn't choose. THAT is the difference. And is Buehrer actually suggesting that when a teacher chooses a book, she has to explain in detail why she didn't choose every other book that's ever been published on the face of the earth?! That's absurd! If she is justified in her choice, then she doesn't need to defend it against every other book. When you choose a cereal, do you go into detail about why you SHOULDN'T buy every other cereal that's ever been made in every part of the world? Of course not.
What annoys me most of all, is the hypocrisy that the AFA is always spewing. I wonder if it's a requirement for them? Buehrer claims that we should outlaw books that contain swear words because they are offensive. Now, in Rev. R.J Rooney's article: Concerning School Prayer, he defends prayer in school claiming that things being "offensive" and "intrusive" are not reason enough to outlaw them from the schools. In the third paragraph of his article, Rooney says that "Yes, public prayer is intrusive to some people. But so are commercials. So are sports commentators. I found the views of some of my teachers in high school, college, and seminary to be offensive and intrusive". He also answers the question: Isn’t public prayer an intrusion in the life of a person of another faith? by saying: "probably. But isn’t the very nature of the Gospel itself intrusive?" So according to Rooney, having things which are offensive in our schools is no reason to censor them! Need more proof of the AFA's hypocrisy? How about this one? In an article written by David Sisler called "The Bible is Offensive! Thank God!", the author tells us that the Bible IS offensive, but we should never censor it. Sisler says in the 7th paragraph that "there are many reasons that the Good Book is offensive to its readers – and when living in violation of some of its precepts, it was offensive to me – but its greatest offense is its declaration that the way to heaven is only through personal faith in Jesus of Nazareth." So, he admits the Bible is offensive, but claims that the message is one that is too important to ignore (whether we believe the message or not). How ironic that Buehrer claims that message is second only to the wording of the text. Shouldn't we REMOVE the bible and find another book which conveys the same message but doesn't use words like "hell"? After all, with 50,000 books published every year, is this the best stuff we can recommend?
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