When my son was in the 1st or 2nd grade, he wanted to read “The Lord of the Rings.” The movies had just come out and were rated PG-13, and I remember them being pretty violent, so I said no. I suggested starting with “The Hobbit”; that is a gentler story, and in a couple of years, after I reread the series, we would see. One day, he came home and tried to rush upstairs to study, which was not really in character for him at that age, so I got suspicious. It turns out that he had gotten the book from the school library – a school that held K-4 and, in my opinion, shouldn’t have a book as mature as the LOR series. It turns out that they didn’t – it was in the high school library. Any child in the district could, at that time, get any book from within the system, which seemed to me to be a dangerous process.
I called his principal and explained my situation, that I didn’t want to censor or remove books; I just want the reading material to be age appropriate. I asked him if he could have a permission slip for a guardian to sign for any book not in his library; he agreed. No threats or ignorance or arguing – we discussed the problem and solved it in a way that benefitted everyone. This is why we have movie ratings and suggested reading ages for books – not everything is appropriate for everyone. There’s a difference between a true story about a penguin family with two dads and a graphic novel about sex. There’s a difference between a book with profanity and a kid’s story about using proper words.
When my wife read the Harry Potter books to our children, she kept some of the more frightening scenes from them, which they figured out when they read them for themselves. When I read the Bible in church, I don’t include the frightening, violent, and sexual stories as they are, because they are not appropriate for younger people. I don’t prohibit them from reading them; I am just careful about what is included. Common sense dictates care for others. We shouldn’t be banning books – we should be curating them. We shouldn’t be censoring comedians – the market will decide if they stay on the air. Let’s use the brains God gave us, instead of acting like dimwits. Censorship is one of the first steps towards tyranny, and we are getting closer to it every day.
Prayer – God, help us to respect one another’s freedoms while being considerate of all people. Amen.
Today’s art is “The Life of Washington” by Victor Arnautoff has been in a hallway in a San Francisco high school for 100 years, and is the subject of controversy – some want it removed because they believe it glorifies slavery.