{"id":1916,"date":"2021-03-05T18:26:15","date_gmt":"2021-03-06T00:26:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=1916"},"modified":"2021-03-05T18:26:15","modified_gmt":"2021-03-06T00:26:15","slug":"censorship-sucks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=1916","title":{"rendered":"Censorship Sucks!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>When I first heard about a possible censorship of Dr. Seuss books, like so many others, I said: \u201cWhat?\u201d\u00a0 My eighteen years of working at the American Civil Liberties Union gave me experience to ask, \u201cwho is the censor?\u201d\u00a0 Not that censorship is okay under any condition, but usually, the censor is a third party that finds something objectionable to their own beliefs and attempts to stop the artist, author, or distributor from allowing the objectionable material to be read or seen by others.<\/p>\n

Facebook was abuzz with people saying that this censorship was cancel-culture and that they would continue to read Dr. Seuss books, even the ones that have been banned.\u00a0 The words \u201ccancel-culture\u201d caught my eye.<\/p>\n

First of all, the books are not banned; they will no longer be published.\u00a0 That\u2019s a big difference.\u00a0 Second, the decision was made by Dr. Seuss Enterprises, the licensing entity holding rights of publishing for all of his books.\u00a0 It\u2019s not a third party claiming that the books are offensive; it\u2019s the heirs.<\/p>\n

I never read Dr. Seuss books as a child, and I don\u2019t remember an adult reading them to me, either.\u00a0 Perhaps I was too young to remember, but knowing my family, I\u2019m sticking to the former.\u00a0 Even in adulthood, I thought these books probably originated in 1950 or later.<\/p>\n

Two of the books that have been discontinued are the first Dr. Seuss book, \u201cAnd to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street<\/em>\u201d published in 1937; and \u201cIf I Ran the Zoo<\/em>,\u201d which was published in 1950.\u00a0 These books have been around for quite some time.\u00a0 Many Dr. Seuss books were written in the 1950s.<\/p>\n

Do you remember reading \u201cAnd to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street?<\/em>\u201d\u00a0 If that book is still in a bookcase at home, you had better hold on to it.\u00a0 It is selling for $350 on Amazon.\u00a0 \u201cIf I Ran the Zoo<\/em>\u201d goes anywhere from $499 to $799.99.\u00a0 \u201cGreen Eggs & Ham<\/em>,\u201d and \u201cThe Cat in the Hat<\/em>\u201d are still popular books, and they will continue to be printed.<\/p>\n

Dr. Seuss, whose real name is Theodor Seuss Geisel, was a political cartoonist for a New York newspaper in the early 1940s.\u00a0 He admitted to using \u201charmful stereotypes to caricature Japanese and Japanese-Americans.\u00a0 Decades later, he said he was embarrassed by the cartoons, which he said were \u2018full of snap judgments that every political cartoonist has to make.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Based upon his reconciliation regarding those political cartoons, it doesn\u2019t surprise me that his foundation would proceed with the discontinuation of some of his books.\u00a0 Dr. Seuss was a kind man who didn\u2019t want to offend anyone.\u00a0 If he were alive today, he may agree with this decision.<\/p>\n

I have to agree that this matter borders on censorship.\u00a0 However, it\u2019s not the type of censorship that we usually see.\u00a0 No one has pulled these books from the bookshelves; they will no longer be printed.\u00a0 They\u2019ll still be available to read; you just have to find them in order to read them.\u00a0 Censorship is \u201cthe suppression or prohibition of any parts of books, films, news, etc. that are considered obscene, politically unacceptable, or a threat to security.\u201d<\/p>\n

The foundation\u2019s decision to halt the printing of these books does not fall under the definition of \u201csuppression or prohibition.\u201d\u00a0 There is no movement to prevent anyone from reading these discontinued books.<\/p>\n

But is it cancel-culture?\u00a0 \u201cThe Cat\u2019s Quizzer<\/em>,\u201d one of the discontinued books, \u201chasn\u2019t sold in years through the retailers BookScan tracks.\u201d\u00a0 It seems like this move by Dr. Seuss Enterprises is a financial decision in many ways.\u00a0 \u201cCancel culture (or call-out culture) is a modern form of censorship in which someone is thrust out of social or professional circles \u2013 whether it be online, on social media, or in person.\u201d\u00a0 This decision doesn\u2019t even come close to the newfound definition of cancel-culture.<\/p>\n

In the 1970s, I read a book to my daughters that all three of us enjoyed immensely.\u00a0 \u201cIt Could Be Worse<\/em>\u201d was written by Margot Zemuch.\u00a0 It was a story of a married man named Ivan who was upset that the house smelled of cooking, the children were screaming, etc.\u00a0 He went to the Rabbi who told him to bring the chickens into the house.\u00a0 When that didn\u2019t work, he was told to bring in the dog and the cat into the house; next the goats.\u00a0 This went on with the cow and the horse.\u00a0 Finally, poor Ivan couldn\u2019t take it anymore.\u00a0 The Rabbi told him to take all the animals out of the house, sweep and clean it, and come back when everything was done.\u00a0 Ivan was happy and smelled the sweetness of dinner cooking and the thrill of the children’s laughter.\u00a0 Ivan brought the Rabbi wine and bread as a token of appreciation.\u00a0 The moral, of course, was in the title of the book.\u00a0 Things can be worse.<\/p>\n

In the 1990s, I went looking for that book to read to a different child.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t find the same book, but I found a book by Margot Zemuch called \u201cIt Could Always Be Worse<\/a><\/em>.\u201d \u00a0It was the same story with some changes.\u00a0 The Rabbi was now a wise man, the token gifts at the end of the story did not have wine, and word \u2018always\u2019 was added to the title.\u00a0 There may have been some other changes, but the point is that the moral of story remained the same.\u00a0 Yes, words were adapted to make the story more politically correct.\u00a0 But if you hadn\u2019t read the first edition you would never had known that it was revised to be acceptable to a wider audience.<\/p>\n

Public outcry may prompt Dr. Seuss Enterprises to allow Random House to print these books with modest changes.\u00a0 It\u2019s sort of like \u201cThe New Coke.\u201d\u00a0 It won\u2019t be the same as the old books, but after time, we\u2019ll realize that the story is the same.\u00a0 Change is inevitable.\u00a0 It just doesn\u2019t happen as fast as it did in \u201cDirty Dancing.\u201d [In this movie, the 1960s changed into the 1970s overnight.]<\/p>\n

Go ahead and add these six books to the list of others that have been censored at one time or another: Catcher in the Rye<\/em> (I had to read this book twice to figure out why it was banned); Huckleberry Finn<\/em>; just about any book by Judy Blume; Fahrenheit 541<\/em>; The Bible<\/em>; Gone With the Wind<\/em>; and Mein Kampf<\/em>, just to name a few.\u00a0 And these books have not been censored nor discontinued by the authors or their heirs.<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t quite reach the level of saying this is censorship, but if you own one of these six books, hang on to it.\u00a0 It just became worth a whole lot more.<\/p>\n

Censorship sucks!\u00a0 However, it also sells books.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I first heard about a possible censorship of Dr. Seuss books, like so many others, I said: \u201cWhat?\u201d\u00a0 My eighteen years of working at the American Civil Liberties Union gave me experience to ask, \u201cwho is the censor?\u201d\u00a0 Not … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[829,830,831,826,828,833,832,827],"class_list":["post-1916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-youth","tag-bookscan","tag-cancel-culture","tag-censorship","tag-dr-seuss","tag-dr-seuss-enterprises","tag-judy-blume","tag-margot-zemuch","tag-theodor-seuss-geisel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1916"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1917,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1916\/revisions\/1917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}