What Happens When We Censor Books

Censoring books is like a grocery store filled with red apples and Noxzema. If you can get by on apples and Noxzema, you’re all set. If not, you’ll either have to grow or make your food and beauty products to your taste, or…… find someone who is making or growing grocery products.

That pretty much sums up how censorship works.

Now, I’m going to share a short uncensored story, since that’s what I do…is share stories.

A major peeve I had as a child was (in censorship language) being very agnostic to filters put on information I was allowed access to. I loathed censorship, which here’s where I’m expanding on the topic, given how my prior post skirted around; What My ‘Children’ Think Of My Writing.

I vowed not to censor information when it came time for me to raise children. While I didn’t intentionally introduce my children to what I’ll call wickedness, there was no baby-talking, or replacing adult language and names of body parts with cutesy terms and phraseologies. Whatever questions they had, they got my best, sincerest answer.

So one day I’m invited to see this movie. Clueless about what the movie was about, except that it was supposed to be this MUST SEE film, I took my kids along. They were small… so small that they folded up in the seats. I had to hold one, and the other I had to hold the seat down so we could watch… Scarface.

As the film got to rolling, getting more and more involved in this ultra sultry story, even I had to say, ‘wait a minute… let me get these kids out of here.’

But more amazing than the movie, I was completely taken for a loop to hear my kids cry “Nooooo!!!” They didn’t want to leave the theatre.

To be clear, while I wasn’t a censorship fan, I also wasn’t trying to scare and scar my children for life either. But even my youngest, not yet walking, wanted to see that film in its entirety. And watch the film they did, the entire picture, in complete silence with their eyes wide open. Unbelievable.

The reason I’m fond of this story is because today my kids are movie buffs; film aficionados. So this isn’t a pitch to advocate one type of parenting over the other. There’s lots to get wrong and right with parenting; even if it just so happens that my children are ten times more conservative than their mother.

And oooooo, 

I'm about to read a book I can't wait to share my thoughts!