On The Topic Of Literary Censorship For Children

I went ahead and wrote a comment for Tawnya's blog post about whether or not to censor children's literature, but I was too chicken to actually save it in a forum where I knew lots of the other people had kids. People who are parents have a tendency to summarily dismiss my views or plans for motherhood because I haven't yet had the opportunity to have children. (The truth? Despite my vocal declarations that I'm not ready to be a mother, we haven't done a thing to prevent pregnancy. It really just hasn't happened yet.) But Since I was married in November, my mind has been working overtime, forming plans that I hope will at least be guidelines I can follow when I do become a mother.

I grew up in a household where censorship of any kind did not exist. My mom loves murder mysteries, true crime and action/adventure, both in her books and in her movies. Moreover, she spent several years living in Europe, where she learned to be very comfortable with sex and nudity. She never made any attempt to hide anything from me. I remember her taking me to see Rambo III in the theater when I was seven years old. I remember making some comment about whether this movie was really appropriate. I don't remember my exact words, so my mind forms the expressions in words I would use now, but I know I said something. My mom assured me that everything would be OK. We watched the movie, which, at the time, was the most violent movie ever made. I honestly don't feel scarred. In my heart of hearts, I don't feel that Rambo damaged me in any way.

While in Europe, my mother had purchased miniature replicas of Michaelangelo's sculptures, David and Bathsheba. They were both naked. David stood proudly with his hips thrust out, penis fearlessly displayed. Bathsheba was portrayed in a bent stance, drying her leg with a towel. She wore a flirtatious, inviting expression on her face, and her towel concealed nothing of her body. These statues mortified me as a child. I turned them around on the shelf so that only their butts were visible, and whenever my mom noticed what I had done she chided me and turned them back around. She insisted that they were art, and that the blatant sexuality they conveyed was acceptable in this medium. This was her answer, in fact, whenever I felt offended by sexually charged material in movies, TV shows and paintings as well. It's art. It's beautiful.

At age eleven, when asked to write a story for class, I wrote a vivid depiction of rape. I knew by the stunned silence that rang in my ears when I was finished reading my story aloud that I had done the wrong thing. Maybe if we were older it would have gone over better. To me, the story was a commentary about things were wrong in the world. In my mind, it was right that this story should be written. Looking back, I can see how precocious I was, and how this sort of topic might be uncomfortable for others. My mom, however, saw absolutely nothing wrong with it.

There was one time, when I was twelve years old, when my mom and I left a used bookstore in Bremerton and she caught sight of the cover illustration on the book I had purchased. It depicted a woman fully clothed in medieval style clothing, holding a sword that dripped blood. At last, I had found something that offended her.

"Cydni, I don't want your heroes to be killers." She told me firmly.

"She's not a killer. She only fights because she has to."

"And does she kill people?"

"Well. yeah. But only because she has to."

"So in other words, she's a killer."

"Well..."

"I don't want your heroes to be killers, Cydni."

Really, I failed to see the difference between the character in my fantasy novel and the detectives or spies or agents in her action movies who sometimes killed out of necessity. I still don't understand the distinction. I do know that she never made any attempt to take books away from me based on what was inside. Nor did she try to guilt me out of reading them. It was entirely up to me to decide what I did or did not want to see, and usually I chose to stop watching long before she did. I'm remembering a wildly explicit European movie she rented, that I walked out on despite her urging me to stay and watch it with her. I was twelve.

When I reached a point where I wanted to learn about sex, I turned to the literature. I read books of all sorts, from graphic sex scenes to educational reading. My mom never checked up on what I was reading, and even if she had, I doubt she would have seen anything wrong with my choices. After all, I had been the one all along who dictated what I was willing to see and when. Besides, my books were small fry compared to the movies she was renting and bringing home to watch with my dad. I was the one who decided I didn't want to watch the pornos. I had the opportunity.

By this time I was a teenager, and our family was living in areas of Nevada where prostitution was legal, and where the brothels and nudie bars advertised with billboards. I lived in an environment where pursuit of casual sex was encouraged, and it offended me to the core. This was the aspect of Las Vegas life I hated most, and it was instrumental in my decision to go to college in Utah. Even at age seventeen, when I settled on SUU, I was busy narrowing my own experiences based on what I thought was appropriate.

And yet, even knowing myself the way I do, or perhaps because of this, the idea of forbidding my children to read whatever they want to is profoundly disconcerting to me. I would expect them to be upset to learn about things like pain and people hurting each other, but I honestly think I would be doing them a disservice to try to hide the negative aspects of life from them. I've always felt very strongly that I would teach my children that life absolutely SUCKS and that the way we react to life's challenges is what defines who we are. Writing this, I am reminded of one of my mother's favorite expressions: "Life's hard, then you die."

Really, in my heart of hearts, I know that my children will be precisely who they are no matter what I do. I also know that there's really no point trying to shield them from life's heartbreaks, or act as if deep pain were anything other than completely normal. Additionally, I will most likely find some way to mess up their lives no matter how hard I try not to. But I really don't think monitoring their reading will help anything. I think it would only point them in the direction of the things I don't want them to learn, which would make them all the more curious.

But that also creates a new question in my mind: is there anything I really don't want my children to learn about? The more I ponder this question, the more convinced I feel that there are appropriate ways to address any topic this child feels curious about, and that censorship really isn't necessary. I feel much more comfortable with a full-disclosure style of parenting where I simply tell my children all about life and let them choose what they will pay attention to when they are ready.

And that's why, thirty years in the future, there will be another young redhaired woman who will write a blog very similar to this one, about how her mother never shielded her from the reality of life and how, in the end, her mom was absolutely right.