First I heard about a parent complaining that their child happened to come across “oral sex” in a dictionary at the school. The school district briefly pulled the dictionary out of their schools. First of all, it’s a dictionary! It gives definitions. I don’t know if the child stumbled across it, or deliberately looked it up. In any case, I would be happy to know that my child got the correct definition AND talked to me about it, rather than asking some other kid in the class.

Anyway, I’m not sure of the exact details of what happened, but to ban a dictionary?!? If you ask me that’s just crazy.

Then today I heard this story where a parent complained about the sexual references in Anne Frank’s diary. The book that they are talking about it the unedited version, The Diary of a Young Girl: The Definitive Edition. That school district pulled that book as well and they are going to replace it with the edited edition. This one I can kind of understand. However if a child is old enough to read about her life hiding from the Nazis, I think they can handle the sexual curiosity that Anne writes about. She was the same age as the eighth graders that are reading the book.

What are your thoughts on this? Ban these books or keep them in school?

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