Imagine yourself as a child, and you just found out your favorite book is no longer available in the school library–taken off the shelf by adults who deemed it inappropriate for you.
It is a story about a girl who loves the color pink. “Pinkalicious.”
It is a story about the friendship between a pig and a spider. “Charlotte’s Web.”
It is a story about the relationship between a boy and a special tree. “The Giving Tree.”
So many children will grow up never having the chance to read these stories because some of their parents believe they go against their values.
Book banning is the censorship of minority communities and what they stand for. They are challenged for outrageous reasons and are introduced simply because people want to push their beliefs on others.
For example, “Pinkalicious,” by Victoria Kann, was banned because some parents believed it would encourage their children to eat sweets excessively. Kann said she was baffled by this idea, because the book teaches kids to love themselves while eating healthy and in moderation. So why then in Wilson County, Tennessee, was the beloved story banned when it only promotes self-love and a healthy relationship with food?
Some other reasons books get targeted by bans are because they include racial diversity, body positivity, LGBTQ+ characters, themes of social justice and other supposedly “inappropriate” ideas.
How are those kids from marginalized communities supposed to feel when they are being told they are not normal because of the color of their skin or who their parents are? They will no longer have representation of kids who look like them in the stories they read and are taught from.
Another example of a banned children’s book is “Separate Is Never Equal” by Duncan Tonatiuh, a true story about a Black family before desegregation. Banning a true story is erasing history from all the people who experienced the injustice of segregation right out from under them. It is basically telling them, “We don’t think kids should know about what happened to you, we don’t want them to know we were the bad guys.”
There are already so many kids who cannot read at their age level in the United States, and taking books off the shelf will not help our national literacy rate. The National Assessment of Education Progress reported that only 43% of fourth-grade students scored at or above the proficient reading level. The percentages are even lower for children in marginalized communities. We should not want this for future generations.
Book banning is detrimental to children’s critical thinking and empathy skills. Being exposed to diverse perspectives and people makes for more well-rounded and kind adults, knowledgeable about different cultures and the world around them. Without that exposure, it will be hard for children to challenge their parent’s beliefs and resist ideas like censorship in the future.
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This is how many dystopian books begin: “The Handmaid’s Tale,” “Brave New World,” “The Giver,” “1984” and “Fahrenheit 451” are just a few examples. In these stories, book banning is just the start of totalitarian control over anyone who looks or thinks differently. Ironically, all these books are banned in some places.
Books are not the only thing being banned and shut down currently. Under President Donald Trump, offices of diversity, equity and inclusion have been shut down in the federal government. He has also barred transgender recruits from enlisting in the military and declared that the U.S. will only recognize two genders.
These orders will continue to harm people in marginalized communities and affect how those people get treated. He wants to instill fear in the American people and isolate those who are different. Banning books is just the start.
Read banned books.
Venezia McHenry is a first year double majoring in journalism and creative writing. She writes for The Miami Student and is part of the Honors Student Advisory Board.
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