Friday, Sept. 30th - Banned Books: How do you feel about the censorship of the freedom to read? Do you think the education system needs to be more strict on what children are exposed to in books?
I don't agree on censorship or banning books though I agree that there are some books with edgier themes out there that are not suitable for children. But to say that all children think the same, understand the same, and should not read these books is untrue. There are some fourteen year old kids that are more mature than some eighteen years old.
To me, the education system shouldn't be the one who decides what a child should or should not read. It's not their place to push their opinions or beliefs on children. It's the job of the parent. Only they know what their child is capable of. I think there should be some way of asking what parents would like or not like their children to read and base curriculum off of that. Or if there are "controversial" books in the library have them placed in a certain section and have children bring permission slips before being able to check those books out.
I actually wrote a blog post about this topic after a certain article made it's way around twitter. You can find that here for a longer explanation. But basically it's a parents right to decide what they feel their child is able to handle and understand, they know their child. If a child doesn't have someone around to do that for them, they need those books that much more.
