If you’ve been to the library within the past few years, you might’ve noticed a section called challenged books. Books like Fahrenheit 451, The Handmaid’s Tale, To Kill a Mockingbird, and 1984. (1) Books akin to Fahrenheit 451, 1984, Hunger Games, and so on tell dystopian stories and are book essentials everybody should pick up at least once. They’ve always been challenged, and unfortunately those challenges will never be going away. In most dystopian stories like The Giver, another challenged book, it talks about the leaders in society very closely watching their citizens grow up, and by the time they’re 12, they’re given permanent jobs, unable to choose their spouses, etc. With how our government is nowadays, we always need to be especially wary, after all, most of the people who run/ran our government within the past 10 years were all there during the Civil Rights movement, had probably seen campaigning for this, and were against it. Claudette Colvin, who, akin to Rosa Parks refused to move from the “White section” passed away very recently. The very act of book banning/burning goes hand in hand with taking over and fully controlling a society. When you see books that talk about the experience of being a minority like Brave Face, Gender Queer, and The Bluest Eyes, being challenged and burned, it gives onlookers the impression that these things are not okay, it’s not okay to be gay, trans, or Black and these people are lesser than. Media centered around these issues are almost always going to be challenged by the white conservative, that’s just how it is, because it is so ingrained in our society that we have to fit into this certain criteria.
Regardless. Banned books have a special place in my heart, they’ll never not have that special place. Everybody deserves an outlet to express their opinions and experiences. The only way we can really educate ourselves on another groups experiences is if we read, and read, and read.
