Bad news for former Clinton-era national poet-laureate Maya Angelou. The AP reports:
FOND DU LAC — Some Fond du Lac parents have asked school officials to remove former U.S. poet laureate Maya Angelou’s autobiography from the high school curriculum..Students at Fond du Lac High School read "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" in sophomore advanced English classes..
But some parents have objected to passages that describe Angelou’s rape and subsequent unwanted pregnancy. About 80 people attended a meeting Tuesday at the school this week to discuss the book and the request to remove it..
School Superintendent Gregory Maass said the initial complaint came from one family..
"We had a mother and father and student who questioned the book," he said. "The high school provided the student with an alternative book.".
The parents were not satisfied and asked for the book to be removed from the curriculum, Maass said..
Fond du Lac High School Principal Mary Fran Merwin said parents, teachers, principals and at least two ministers spoke at the meeting, where no decision was made. She said the school has used the book for a decade..
"It is Angelou’s own account of growing up," Merwin said. "It has a number of attributes, and it’s a historically relevant story about a black woman growing up in the United States."
One day, back when my daughter was 12 or 13, a neighbor for whom she babysat gave her this book. Being political, and knowing who Maya Angelou was, I scarfed the book and opened it up to a random page. I was shocked to find myself reading the author discuss the "crabs in her ‘giney’." I opened the front door and flung this garbage passing itself as literature into the street. I remain pissed off at this neighbor to this very day for her attempt at corrupting my daughter’s youth (she is a flaming liberal that works for the state and knew my family as being conservative).
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The Wikipedia describes the book:
Quite graphic in nature, the text deals with issues of childhood, rape, racism, and sexism..The book has fallen under the criticism of many parents, mostly because it is required reading in many school districts… The book contains graphic explicit descriptions of Maya being raped at the age of eight. It also includes descriptions of her older brother luring girls into a tent to play "Mama and Papa" (have sex – although at the time he doesn’t really know what it is – they are just pretending). Near the end of the book, Maya begins experimenting with lesbianism and eventually asks a random man to have sex with her to prove she is not a lesbian.
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While I don’t believe in banning books per se, I think there should be appropriate rules of decorum in certain venues- the school being one. The passages I read were definitely not suitable for my daughter to read at her age. I question whether 10th graders should be reading such stuff- especially 10th grade boys. Lesbianism? Child rape? Random sex? Fantastic! And we wonder why things are the way they are in today’s society. Anybody who tries to force this crap on young teenagers ought to their heads examined…