With the thought that someone can be hurt by reading a book, people will try to challenge and ban them. To ban a book is to have it restricted from a certain age or audience. Banning and challenging books is trying to keep a certain book away from an audience due to sexual content, going against religious beliefs, language and vulgarity, violence, drugs, self-harm, racism, occult/satanic views, promoting gangs, and going against community standards. An argument from someone who believes books should not be banned is that it is important for the age group to learn about certain content and material as they grow up. Due to controversial content, the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald should be banned. Many books are challenged and …show more content…
banned every year, due to talk about the content in them. “Some of the most controversial books in history are now regarded as classics. The Bible and works by Shakespeare are among those that have been banned over the past two thousand years” (Bannings and Burnings in History).
Banning and challenging books started to become recognized almost as a problem in 1982, when the largest number of books at the time had been challenged as not suitable or appropriate for an age group. Ever since then books are criticized for sexual content, going against religious beliefs, language and vulgarity, violence, drugs, self-harm, racism, occult/satanic views, promoting gangs, and going against community standards. An example of a book that has been banned is The Catcher in The Rye by J. D. Salinger, since it has been banned from multiple libraries and schools for sexual and vulgar content (Santipr). Many people whose books have been challenged or banned have argued that the first amendment says something different. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free …show more content…
exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for the redress of grievances” (U.S. Constitution: First Amendment). Freedom of any persons' speech to state what they feel, write what they feel, and to publish political and social beliefs/opinions is the basic idea and argument made. This is true, although many parents with kids in elementary, middle, and high school all have different opinions about certain books and what is appropriate for their child's age. Because a school and/or parent can choose what they want the child to learn and be exposed to, they can challenge the book the child is assigned to read. As expected, the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald has been challenged. “The book has never been formally banned from being taught, though it has faced serious challenges, most notably in 1987 by the Baptist College in Charleston, South Carolina, which challenged the book and called for its banning from public schools” (Sallus). Due to many people finding the book more positive than the negatives, it has never been formally banned from a library or school publically. But that does not mean it has not been seriously challenged. A more recognized time it was challenged was in 1987 by the Baptist College in Charleston, South Carolina. The College decided to try to ban it from its public schools because of ''language and sexual references” (Garrity). UnsuccessfullyThe Baptist College failed the attempt to ban it. Around the same time, officials from the Bay County School District in Pensacola, Florida, tried to ban a total of 64 books, with The Great Gatsby. “Bay County School District in Pensacola, Florida, attempted to ban 64 books, including The Great Gatsby for containing inappropriate learning material” (Garrity). Officials from the Bay County School District endorsed these claims by showing that the novel included ''a lot of vulgarity'' as well as curse words. "I don't like vulgarity," said Leonard Hall, Bay County District Superintendent (Garrity) "I don't approve of content like that in my children. I don't approve of it in any child on a school ground” (Lombardi). Out of the 64 books challenged, only 2 books were successfully found not appropriate for the age group, and The Great Gatsby was not one of them. After many other schools and libraries have tried to justify banning The Great Gatsby, the farthest attempt to ban it was when the book was brought to one county Board of Education, where it was deemed appropriated for the grade intended to read it. Reasons for The Great Gatsby to be banned by schools and libraries that have challenged the book are for sexual references, and just dirty content.
An example of this content is in the book “I looked at Miss Baker, wondering what it was she got done. I enjoyed looking at her” (Fitzgerald 13-14). This is a clear example of why the novel should be banned. As Nick Carraway is meeting Tom and Daisy Buchanan, their friend Jordan Baker is at the house. Nick then goes on to talk to her and describe her in an inappropriate manner. “She was a slender, small-breasted girl, with an erect carriage, which she accentuated by throwing her body backward at the shoulders like a young cadet. Her gray sun-strained eyes looked back at me with polite reciprocal curiosity out of a wan, charming, discontented face” (Fitzgerald 1.13-14). These comments are clearly unsuitable for anyone in elementary, and could even be argued that they are inappropriate for middle/high school. These adult references can wrongly influence someone who reads the novel that based on the kind of person Nick is, that it is okay to do what he does. The comment could also not be understood by the reader, which could be in a classroom/library. One more reason the novel should be banned is because it promotes alcoholism and illegal business. "I found out what your 'drug stores' were.’ He turned to us and spoke rapidly. ‘He and this Wolfsheim bought up a lot of side-street drug-stores here and in Chicago and sold grain alcohol
over the counter. That's one of his little stunts. I picked him for a bootlegger the first time I saw him, and I wasn't far wrong" (Fitzgerald 7.284). This is promoting selling alcohol, along with lots of alcohol consumption in the novel. When a person is reading this, whether they are in middle school or elementary school, they may find that alcohol seems ok and good based on the way it is portrayed and sold illegally in the novel. Due to all the sensitive content in The Great Gatsby, the novel should be challenged and banned because it is unsuitable for young audiences.
There are multiple reasons why a book can be banned or challenged. Book banning causes the removal of materials in schools and libraries due to “inappropriate” content. The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold, was banned due to sexual content and language.
Baldassarro, R. Wolf. Banned Books Awareness: “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger. 23 1 2011. 10 11 2013 .
Did you ever think that books that have sex, obscene language, and immoral subjects can make a good book? The Catcher in the Rye has been on the banned reading list for exactly those reasons. The book was mainly put on disapproval from between 1966 and 1975 in almost every school district in the United States. The book was said to be so bad that in 1960 a teacher in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was fired for assigning the book to an eleventh-grade English class. Despite some opposition to the novel, however, J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye should be on a reading list for the freshman students because it gives a crystal clear image on how the world is in violence, sex, and obscenity and the book also teaches the motifs of lying and deception.
Such issues have supplemented the controversial nature of the book and in turn, have sparked the question of whether or not this book should be banned. The novel, The Catcher In the Rye, should not be banned from inclusion in the literature courses taught at the high school level. & nbsp;... ... middle of paper ... ... Banning books is unconstitutional.
Does The Great Gatsby merit the praise that it has received for many decades? “Why I despise The Great Gatsby” is an essay by Kathryn Schulz at New York Magazine in which Schulz states that she has read it five times without obtaining any pleasure from it. Long viewed as Fitzgerald’s masterpiece and placed at or near the uppermost section of the English literary list, The Great Gatsby has been used as a teaching source in high schools and universities across the United States. The novel is narrated by Nick Carraway, a Midwesterner who moved to Long Island, next door to an elegant mansion owned by a mysterious and affluent Jay Gatsby. The story follows Gatsby and Nick’s unusual friendship and Gatsby’s pursuit of a married woman named Daisy.
"Book Banning." Current Issues: Macmillian Social Science Library. Detroit: Gale, 2010. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 31 Jan. 2011.
Although some think that the banning of books isn’t as common now as it was in the past, that is true, however J.D. Salinger’s book has had disputes over the censorship as recent a 2010 and has been disputed/banned in states as South Carolina, Minnesota, Montana, and Maine from 2001-2010. . “Wolf, Baldassarro R. "World.eduNewsBlogsCoursesJobsPartners." Worldedu Banned Books Awareness The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger Comments. World.edu, 11 Jan. 2011. Web. 8 Nov. 2013.” The controversy that surrounds the book focuses on a young boy by the name of Holden...
There are many reasons why books get challenged and/or banned. According to Robert Doyle, the main reasons for banned are sex, profanity, and racism (Doyle, 3). The most common initiator of the challenge is a parent or group of parents (Challenges by, chart 2). Challenges can also come from: patrons, board members, or organizations (Challenges by, chart 2). Challenges can also come from whole institutions; usually they come from schools (Challenges by, chart 3).
What does it mean to ban a book? A banned book is one that has been removed from the shelves of a library, bookstore, or classroom because of its controversial content. (About.com) Before banning, a book must be challenged. A challenge is an attempt to remove or restrict materials, based upon the objections of a person or group. (About Banned And Challenged Books) A book is challenged when a person or group dislikes some of its content, and wishes to have it removed. Often times, it is banned for obscenities and is considered unsuited for the set age group, or any age group.
Banned books are books to which free access is not allowed. The practice of banning books is a method of book censorship, and often has political, religious or moral motivations. Catching fire the second book in the hunger games trilogy. The book is banned and I believe that is shouldn’t be banned. The reasons are it has excessive violence, causes nightmares in children, and some believe is anti-ethnic. I think Catching fire shouldn’t be banned because the book teaches a lesson to never give up. But high school students should be able to read the book because it’s very influential on young readers and gives readers that feeling that giving up is not an option and to keep pushing on.
Banning Books “It’s not just the books under fire now that worry me. It is the books that will never be written, the books that will never be read. And all due to the fear of censorship. As always, young readers will be the real losers” (Blume 1999). Judy Blume can not explain the problem of book censorship any clearer.
Every year in the United States we have books being banned and challenged by many people who do not like the contents of books. When researching for this argument essay I found an article written by Rebecca Hagelin. Rebecca Hagelin is the author of Home Invasion: Protecting Your Family in a Culture That’s Gone Stark Raving Mad and the vice president of communications and marketing at the Heritage Foundation (Lankford).
Although being described as a great american classic, The Great Gatsby has been challenged and even banned from public schools! If you don’t already know what a banned or challenged book is, it is when a person or group of people don’t believe a book or books aren’t appropriate for young readers. Books that are believed to be unsuitable are challenged by these people and sometimes are taken out of the library. The most common reason for challenging or banning of books is because it has material that is offensive to religious readers, such as sexual references and drug usages. F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby was challenged because of sexual references and alcohol, which is completely unjust and an infringement on our First Amendment rights.
The most debatable and controversial form of censorship today is the banning of books in school libraries. Banning books that educate students is wrong and selfish. Censorship of books in school libraries is neither uncommon nor an issue of the past. Books with artistic and cultural worth are still challenged constantly by those who want to control what others read. The roots of bigotry and illiteracy that fuel efforts to censor books and free expression are unacceptable and unconditional. Censoring school books in libraries can often lead to censorship of our basic freedoms guaranteed in the First Amendment. In some cases, a minority ends up dictating the majority in censorship cases. To be told what is permissible reading material and what is not is a direct violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution.
Imagine a world where lying, murdering, partying, and cheating on your spouse is allowed and encouraged. Would you want to live in that kind of a world? ¨The Great Gatsby¨ by F. Scott Fitzgerald, which I believe should be banned, is a story in which all of the above goes without consequence. In a fictional town of West Egg illegal activities happen all the time, and the wrongdoers have even taught themselves to justify those activities.