ALA's list of most challenged books in 2005

[MountainLaurel]

One of the most frequently challenged authors of the past decade has two books on the American Library Association's (ALA) list of the most frequently challenged books of 2005. Robie H. Harris' “It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex, and Sexual Health” heads up the list, while “It's So Amazing! A Book about Eggs, Sperm, Birth, Babies, and Families” rounds out the top 10. Both books drew complaints for sexual content.

The ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom received a total of 405 challenges last year. A challenge is defined as a formal, written complaint, filed with a library or school requesting that materials be removed because of content or appropriateness. The majority of challenges are reported by public libraries, schools and school libraries.

According to Judith F. Krug, director of the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom, the number of challenges reflects only incidents reported, and for each reported, four or five likely remain unreported.

http://www.ala.org/ala/pressreleases2006/march2006/05listchallengedbooks.htm

[northofdenali]

1. "Of Mice and Men"????????????????

God protect me from your followers.

[MountainLaurel]

3. Hey, at least it's off the list this year.

:crazy:

Although I'm interested to note that two of the books in the top ten deal with honest discussion of biological processes and sexuality.

[Warpy]

2. Anybody who's read "Huckleberry Finn" as an adult

knows why the fundies hate it. Kids read a rollicking adventure story. Once an adult reads it, he realizes how thoroughly Twain skewers anything to do with religion and the stifling sort of morality the religious nuts want to push on everybody else.

However, to want to ban books explaining sexuality to teenagers who are full of questions for sexual content is beyond nuts.

I guess sex is a terrible chore for fundies. Poor things.

[murielm99]

4. And always "The Chocolate War."

I know somebody who read it in a class at seminary. It is such a great book.

And the Captain Underpants books are just funny. I used to get them from the library for my son. They made him laugh out loud.

Stupid, ignorant wingnuts. They want to take all the fun out of life.

[MountainLaurel]

5. It's a huge irony

That most of the objection to TCW comes from its anti-authoritarian bent. Apparently, children shouldn't be exposed to kids who refuse to be sheep.

[GoneOffShore]

6. Here's a thought

Why not challenge some fundy books? Anything by James Dobson, Dr. Philthy, O'Reilly, Insanity, Coulter.

Might give an interesting twist to the list next year.

[MountainLaurel]

7. There you go

Challenge Dobson's books on the basis that they promote child abuse and provide medically unsound information. Or, as someone mentioned earlier, the Bible: It includes sodomy, incest, horrific violence, etc.

:evilgrin:

[wicket]

8. I love Judy Blume's books

n/t

[davsand]

9. I see "Where's Waldo" isn't on the list again.

That one always amazed hell out of me. Somebody actually challenged the kids' book "Where's Waldo."

For those who have not seen it, the book is a series of mass crowd drawings (cartoon) that challenges kids to find Waldo on the page. Somebody challenged that book at one point because "...on some pages there are dirty things." *

Good luck finding it...

Sendak's book In The Night Kitchen has always been another kids' book that gets hit by the loonies. In the Night Kitchen has a cartoon of a kid with a naked butt showing. The Harry Potter series, of course, is another favorite target because it promotes witchcraft. The Outsiders has made the list because "all the kids come from broken homes." Various translations of the Bible have also been targeted.

I used to be amazed at what people felt compelled to argue about until my kid went to school. There is a Mom I know (her kid is a classmate of my daughter's) who was pissed at the school for bringing in grief counselors after one of the classmates got hit by a car and died. She was pissed because they weren't Christian enough in their views...

I stopped returning her calls after that one.

Loonies abound, and we are well served by the ALA and Banned Book Week because they remind us of just how F**ked up some folks really are.


Laura


* Warning! If you are at work, do NOT do a Google image search for "Where's Waldo" unless you have safe search activated, because on the very first page is a pic of two nekkid women kissing. I have NO idea what that has to do with a kid's book, but it is there...

[MountainLaurel]

10. Funny about "In the Night Kitchen"

When the book first came out, there was a legion of morality police members who went around to libraries pasting little paper diapers on the naked child in the illustrations.

[Katherine Brengle]

11. List of top 100 most frequently challenged books----------->

I have bolded those whose inclusion I find most disturbing:

Scary Stories (Series) by Alvin Schwartz
Daddy’s Roommate by Michael Willhoite
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Harry Potter (Series) by J.K. Rowling
Forever by Judy Blume
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
Alice (Series) by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
My Brother Sam is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
The Giver by Lois Lowry
It’s Perfectly Normal by Robie Harris
Goosebumps (Series) by R.L. Stine
A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Newton Peck
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
Sex by Madonna
Earth’s Children (Series) by Jean M. Auel
The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
Go Ask Alice by Anonymous--this was probably one of the most important books I have read in my entire life.
Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers
In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
The Stupids (Series) by Harry Allard
The Witches by Roald Dahl
The New Joy of Gay Sex by Charles Silverstein
Anastasia Krupnik (Series) by Lois Lowry
The Goats by Brock Cole
Kaffir Boy by Mark Mathabane
Blubber by Judy Blume
Killing Mr. Griffin by Lois Duncan (This one is also very interesting.)
Halloween ABC by Eve Merriam
We All Fall Down by Robert Cormier
Final Exit by Derek Humphry
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
What’s Happening to my Body? Book for Girls: A Growing-Up Guide for Parents & Daughters by Lynda Madaras
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Beloved by Toni Morrison
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
The Pigman by Paul Zindel
Bumps in the Night by Harry Allard
Deenie by Judy Blume
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Annie on my Mind by Nancy Garden
The Boy Who Lost His Face by Louis Sachar
Cross Your Fingers, Spit in Your Hat by Alvin Schwartz
A Light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Sleeping Beauty Trilogy by A.N. Roquelaure (Anne Rice)
Asking About Sex and Growing Up by Joanna Cole
Cujo by Stephen King
James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
The Anarchist Cookbook by William Powell
Boys and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy
Ordinary People by Judith Guest
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
What’s Happening to my Body? Book for Boys: A Growing-Up Guide for Parents & Sons by Lynda Madaras
Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
Crazy Lady by Jane Conly
Athletic Shorts by Chris Crutcher
Fade by Robert Cormier
Guess What? by Mem Fox
The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende
The Face on the Milk Carton by Caroline Cooney
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Native Son by Richard Wright
Women on Top: How Real Life Has Changed Women’s Fantasies by Nancy Friday
Curses, Hexes and Spells by Daniel Cohen
Jack by A.M. Homes
Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo A. Anaya
Where Did I Come From? by Peter Mayle
Carrie by Stephen King
Tiger Eyes by Judy Blume
On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer
Arizona Kid by Ron Koertge
Family Secrets by Norma Klein
Mommy Laid An Egg by Babette Cole
The Dead Zone by Stephen King
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
Always Running by Luis Rodriguez
Private Parts by Howard Stern
Where’s Waldo? by Martin Hanford
Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Greene
Little Black Sambo by Helen Bannerman
Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
Running Loose by Chris Crutcher
Sex Education by Jenny Davis
The Drowning of Stephen Jones by Bette Greene
Girls and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy
How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
View from the Cherry Tree by Willo Davis Roberts
The Headless Cupid by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
The Terrorist by Caroline Cooney
Jump Ship to Freedom by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier

Some of these books shaped me as a human being, as I am sure they did others here--without them, we might not be the good-hearted, open-minded people we are today.

[Norquist Nemesis]

12. I can think of a few that should be on that list

Help, Mom, There are liberals under my bed
Any of the Hate-Merchant screeds by Ann Coulter, Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity. John Gibson (Fauxviews) Attack on Christmas can be there, too.