San Antonio-area schools consider banning "Handmaid's Tale"

[babylonsister]

Originally posted by DUer villager. What next? :( After all these years, it's no longer appropriate?

San Antonio-area schools consider banning "Handmaid's Tale"

Judson ISD considers removing controversial book from curriculum

Amanda Taylor
KNES 5 Eyewitness News


Some parents are calling "The Handmaiden's Tale" by Margaret Atwood sexually graphic, and now the Judson Independent School District superintendent wants it out of the curriculum.

However, some teachers say it should stay. "We've had some ripples over the last years on it but not to this extent," district spokesperson Sean Hoffmann said.

Eleventh-grade students at Judson High School have been reading it for the last 10 years.

"The district certainly does not want to censor our students from appropriate materials, but being a public school system, we can't turn a deaf ear to things and allow our students to be exposed to things the community may not uphold," Hoffmann said.

Atwood's book is about a lower class woman serving as a birthmother for the upper class.

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http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA0320...

[efhmc]

1. Nothing like a banning to make a teen want to read a book.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/snow11.shtml Remember this?

[babylonsister]

2. Wow! That's the truth and how I got to read, "The Diary of Anne

Frank"! A neighbor w/a lending library (elderly woman) wouldn't let me read it when I was about 12.
Mom intervened; she was a reader and wanted me to read anything I could get my hands on. Yeah, Mom!

[VelmaD]

3. That is a pitiful description by the paper of what the book is about...

it's not about "a lower class woman serving as a birthmother for the upper class". It's about women being stripped of all their rights and having no self-determination whatsoever and being FORCED to be birthmothers against their will. Sheesh.

[WolverineDG]

4. My fave

was the comment from Cindy whoever who said she felt it was her duty to get the book banned from Judson so no other kids could read it. I hate self-appointed morals police!

And, btw, from what I recall of "Brave New World," it was a bit more controversial about sex than "Handmaid's Tale." She must not have read that book, since it was given to her kid as an alternate assignment.

My parents were of the "Let 'em read anything, they'll figure it out" variety. And nothing made me want to read "The Miller's Tale" more than the English teacher telling us that we couldn't.

dg

[tanyev]

5. Wouldn't it be simpler for Cindy to just wear a blindfold all day

so she won't be offended by everything she sees? I bought myself a copy of The Handmaid's Tale a couple months ago, while I still can.

[WolverineDG]

6. I'm wondering

if she's going to go door-to-door throughout the district, demanding to inspect each family's library to make sure they only contain books she approves of. I'm sure she'll call CPS if a family has a book she doesn't approve of.

dg