‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ Removed From Mississippi School Curriculum; "Uncomfortable"

Ahh the go to excuse to ban things, "it makes me feel uncomfortable". So out with a classic novel.

A Mississippi school district has pulled “To Kill a Mockingbird” from eighth grade classrooms because the novel “makes people uncomfortable.”

www.thewrap.com...

This was not a school board decision, it was an administrative one. The book had complaints that it makes people fell uncomfortable. But it can stay in the school library (for now), but they're going with a different book. Wonder what book it could be that would not offend anyone?

According to The Sun Herald, the school board did not vote on the move, but rather it was an administrative and department decision made on Wednesday or Thursday.

“There were complaints about it. There is some language in the book that makes people uncomfortable, and we can teach the same lesson with other books,” Kenny Holloway, Biloxi School Board vice president told the paper. “It’s still in our library. But they’re going to use another book in the 8th grade course.”

I really believe there are groups that won’t be happy until all history is erased and they can get America to belive all art, literature, music, etc., started after the year 2000.

I’ll be long gone, but when you young ones look back from 2050 and ask what happened, feel free to focus on this period (circa 2017) as the beginning of the end for our free Republic.

a reply to: Lab4Us

Wonder what their view is on Harry Potter?

originally posted by: seasonal
a reply to: Lab4Us

Wonder what their view is on Harry Potter?

They've tried to ban Harry Potter at sundry schools around the country.

That said, if school administrators don't want to teach, as part of the curriculum, TKAM, that's fine with me. Of course, if a teacher wanted to teach TKAM as part of his or her curriculum and was told they couldn't, I would have a problem with that.

The problem I have is if they try to remove (ban) it from school library shelves.

The American Library Association lists “To Kill A Mockingbird” as No. 21 in the most banned or challenged books in the last decade.

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Sun Herald received a email from a concerned reader who said the decision was made “mid-lesson plan, the students will not be allowed to finish the reading of ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ .... due to the use of the ‘N’ word.”

I don't think they can stop a student from reading it of his or her own volition.

a reply to: seasonal

My kids were taught non-stop about the Holocaust during their junior high school years. Sure it made them uncomfortable but it taught them valuable history.

a reply to: seasonal

I wonder if the '' uncomfortableness'' was due to the depiction of racial inequality present at that time or the use of racial slang used in the book to expose it.

OP seems to have forgotten the part where it is one school district in Mississippi, rather than the entire Mississippi school curriculum, as the inaccurate revised title suggests. Another simple, innocent mistake though, I'm sure. Slow news day-itis. Can happen to anyone.

This is a win for white nationalists.

It made people feel uncomfortable....no. person. Singular. Someone who wants this kind of publicity. For no apparent reason.

What attention hogs we are turning into.

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
a reply to: seasonal

I wonder if the '' uncomfortableness'' was due to the depiction of racial inequality present at that time or the use of racial slang used in the book to expose it.

Yep. I wonder if Huckleberry Finn is next?

a reply to: seasonal

So they aren't banning it outright, but slowly.

Incrementally.

Yeah.

Just like "it was just one flag".

originally posted by: windword

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
a reply to: seasonal

I wonder if the '' uncomfortableness'' was due to the depiction of racial inequality present at that time or the use of racial slang used in the book to expose it.

Yep. I wonder if Huckleberry Finn is next?

You're pretty late to that party. I think the school editions were 'sanitised' a long time ago.

a reply to: seasonal

There is absolutely nothing new about this...

Harry Potter. The Good Earth. Of Mice and Men. Huckleberry Finn. The list is, if not endless, quite long.

Short article.

Wizard of Oz, now that one I didn't know....

a reply to: windword

Long time ago...

a reply to: JohnnyCanuck


I did not know that! But, I guess I should. My sister worked for the DOE "sanitizing" books for mentally challenged students. I should have known there was someone doing for rest of the students.

a reply to: seasonal

As you might well imagine, some religious groups have severe issues with Harry Potter. Our President has openly called, somewhat facetiously, I hope, for it to be burned, after JK Rowling, the author, dared criticize him...

So, nope, little Harry Potter has not been ignored by the idiots who want us all to think alike.

a reply to: windword

I recall having read about complaints about Huck too, in the use of words that were common in those days yet now are, for good reason, shunned. To bad that we have to hide from the past so much.

a reply to: DBCowboy

This is true, these poor poor kids. When a word that a teacher should explain to the children does this to the curriculum, it is just silly.

As Obama would say "it's a teachable moment".

a reply to: tigertatzen

...and a school district in Washington state...I was there for that meeting.

Four books. Huckleberry Finn (for like the sixth or seventh time that I'm aware of), The Good Earth, by Pearl Buck, Maus, and last but not least, Of Mice and Men.

It failed, but only barely. One vote.

School districts all over the country have tried, and succeeded in some cases, to do exactly what this one school district in Mississippi is attempting.

a reply to: seasonal

This is how fragile freedom is.

With a simple majority vote, censorship can become commonplace.