Commentary: When the Joy of Reading Crosses Paths With the Censors

By Linda Hart Green

I do 75% of my seeing out of my right eye. My left eye was damaged at birth. Practically speaking, this means I started wearing glasses at just over two years old. I am terrible at sports involving aiming. My depth perception is off. The glasses I wore as a child were thick, thicker on the left. I was called “four eyes” by other kids.

My solace was reading. I was an early reader, and I read and read. I would look forward to spending my Saturdays devouring a new book. If the weather was nice, my mother would come into the living room and take my books away. “Go outside and play and don’t come home till dinner time,” she would admonish me. She was very practical and believed in lots of fresh air for all. She did not have to coax my brother. He was out the door in a flash.

My outdoor adventures would inevitably wind up with skinned knees or elbows and broken glasses. It was embarrassing to go to school on Monday with a wad of tape holding the nose piece of my glasses together or holding one of the frame sides to the front until they could be repaired. I am so happy for today’s glasses-wearing children who have stretchy frames in fun colors.

I even read the encyclopedia! I was a complete nerd. We had a full set and also a one-volume compilation my father liked to keep in the dining room along with a dictionary to settle word definition and word origin disputes. Now we carry the equivalent of a set of encyclopedias in our pockets.

My parents trusted my teachers and my public school’s administrators to choose my reading materials wisely and appropriately. They were interested in what I was reading, and we talked about it. Later, when I came home from college on the weekends to see friends and do laundry, I always brought books in my Army surplus backpack. I was a sort-of hippie, and it was the early 1970s. My dad enjoyed looking through my textbooks, except my survey of French literature, which I was reading in French. I went to a small, private Christian college and we read many of the French classics. Oh my!

My paternal grandmother and three aunts were teachers. They would have been horrified by the  restrictions on today’s educators. One of my aunts was the principal of a junior high school in Brooklyn, New York. Needless to say, she was a tough cookie. She was strict in discipline and fierce in defending the need for students to develop their minds. They all believed in the importance of intellectual freedom in order for students to grow into mature adults with problem-solving skills, adults who could cope with and contribute to the complex world around them.

When I speak of intellectual freedom, this is what I mean:

“Intellectual freedom is the right of every individual to both seek and receive information from all points of view without restriction. It provides for free access to all expressions of ideas through which any and all sides of a question, cause or movement may be explored.” (Wayne State University Library System website, Sept. 23, 2023.)

Intellectual freedom is under attack in our country and in our county. Here are some sobering statistics from PEN America (pen.org), an organization that champions the freedom to write:

“The freedom to read is under assault in the United States — particularly in public schools — curtailing students’ freedom to explore words, ideas, and books. In the 2022-23 school year, from July 1, 2022, to June 31, 2023, PEN America recorded 3,362 instances of book bans in U.S. public school classrooms and libraries. These bans removed student access to 1,557 unique book titles, the works of over 1,480 authors, illustrators, and translators. Authors whose books are targeted are most frequently female, people of color, and/or LGBTQ+ individuals. Amid a growing climate of censorship, school book bans continue to spread through coordinated campaigns by a vocal minority of groups and individuals and, increasingly, as a result of pressure from state legislation.”

The challenge to and successful ban of 34 books in Nassau County was brought by a vocal minority group with a particular religious and political slant (Citizens Defending Freedom). Their challenges were sustained by state legislation. The states of Florida and Texas are the national hot spots for these challenges and bans.

A saying about individual rights goes like this, “Your freedom to swing your fist ends at the tip of my nose.” All parents have the right and responsibility to nurture and protect their child as they see fit. When another person or persons, who are not the child’s parent or grandparent, swings a fist that bans books, when does that cross the line into censorship?

I was a poorly-sighted little girl who loved to read. That love sustained me and helped me grow through my K-12 years in public schools, four years of private Christian college, three years of theological school and two years of doctoral work.  My love of reading continued to enrich my 35-year career in ministry. I am an avid reader today.

I want that freedom to read and think and grow for every child.