Archive for August, 2010

Banned Books 2010: Baby Be-Bop

To kick off my exciting new hobby, I decided to read the book whose entry on the ALA Challenged Book List confused me the most. Here it is in full:

Baby Be-Bop by Francesca Lia Block
Harper Collins
Four Wisconsin men belonging to the Christian Civil Liberties Union (CCLU) sought $30,000 apiece for emotional distress they suffered from the West Bend, Wis. Community Memorial Library (2009) for displaying a copy of the book. The claim states that “specific words used in the book are derogatory and slanderous to all males” and “the words can permeate violence and put one’s life in possible jeopardy, adults and children alike.” The CCLU called for the public burning of this title. Four months later, the library board unanimously voted 9-0 to maintain, “without removing, relocating, labeling, or otherwise restricting access,” this and other books challenged in the young adult section at the West Bend Community Memorial Library.

Here were the two parts that stood out to me the first time I saw this:

$30,000 apiece
public burning

$30,000?? Because the book was on display?? I can hear what you’re thinking. “What ‘specific words’? What can be worth $30,000 just if you happen to glance at it??? This book has got to be straight smut. That deserves to be publicly burned, like a witch or a Beatles record.”

Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you my friend. The words

$30,000 apiece

and

public burning

totally got my hopes up. This book did maybe not deserve either of these. Here is the basic plot, although, as a very lyrical novella, the word “plot” is used loosely:

Dirk McDonald knows that he’s gay. He’s known since he was young, when the carefree grandmother who raised him tells him it’s just a phase. He has a crush on his best friend Pup, but their relationship ends when Pup starts to date girls to hide his growing attraction to Dirk. “I love you, Dirk, but I can’t handle it.” Dirk lashes out, hiding his fear at himself and the seemingly cruel world around him by building himself an armor of punk rock persona and losing himself in music and violent dancing. Then one night after he tells some skinheads what he thinks about their swastika tattoos, he gets beaten up. Thus begins the much weirder second part of the book, where, in a weird dream/coma state Dirk’s great grandmother appears and tells him her story, and the story of his grandmother, and of his parents, two beat poets who “let go of life” one night in a car accident. Then at the end of the dream a genie appears and tells him about a man named Duck who, we’re supposed to presume, is his future love interest and reason to cling to life.

Aaaand that plot description was about five times racier than the book actually is. It’s only about 100 pages, and most of that is lyrical description. He doesn’t even say the word “gay” until he admits it to a ghost/hallucination of his father on page 86. There’s no sex, certainly nothing described graphically. Dirk mostly contents himself with yearningly thinking about kissing or just not being alone all the time. The word “faggot” is used a few times, mostly by the skinheads who beat him into unconsciousness. So I can’t really decide what “specific words” are “slanderous to all males”, especially if the people objecting and demanding $30,000 for emotional damage didn’t read the book carefully but only glanced through it since it was on display. Unless ladybugs and butterflies are slanderous to all men, because there WAS an awful lot of bug metaphors. Oh, and symbolic dancing. And beat poetry. So, yeah, public burning totes justified.

Seriously, I can’t even really find any “juicy parts” to quote. Unless you count this passage from the beginning, which is something he imagines while playing with his toy trains:

“He was on a train with the fathers–all naked and cookie-colored and laughing. There under the blasts of warm water spurting from the walls as the train moved slick through the land. All the bunching calf muscles dripping water and biceps full of power comforted Dirk. He tried to see his own father’s face but there was always too much steam.”

Later, he dreams of the same train, but instead of water coming out of the shower heads, it’s deadly, deadly gas. There’s a light sprinkling of anti-Nazism running through the book which seems slightly strange just because it remains unelaborated upon. I liked the language of this book. I was able to read it in about an hour, and it was almost like reading poetry. I was afraid it was going to be an angsty typical teen-problem novel, and, although the themes were similar, it had a very light touch, the exact opposite of the usual heavy-handed teen problem fare.

The worst I can say about it is the cover’s kind of blah:

Banned Books 2010: My New Hobby

To give myself a hobby besides complaining about the irrelevance of grad school, I’ve decided to read every book (well, almost every book) on the ALA’s bibliography of banned and challenged books from May 2009-May 2010. This list, which they’re showcasing for Banned Books Week, is slightly arbitrary, in that it only includes titles written up within the year in Newsletter on Intellectual Freedom, but any banned books list is going to be somewhat arbitrary, as it will only discuss reported instances. I’m going to concentrate on the ones which were challenged in public libraries, since that’s my area of interest, and because I find the morality of most school-challengings somewhat murkier. If someone (usually a parent) wants to restrict all children who may or may not share their own beliefs from access to information, I can listen to their objections, go through the process, and generally fight censorship like the idealistic librarian I am. It’s when students are forced to read certain titles in class that I am slightly more uncomfortable. I personally can’t picture myself ever getting uppity over a required text, but I can understand the motivations of people who do. They just want what they think is best for their kids–as opposed to the public library cases, where they just want what they think is best for everyone’s kids. Natch I also don’t agree with helicopter parents constantly overriding teachers’ authority and judgement, and I’m happy to see that in a lot of instances discussed on this year’s list, everyone was content after alternative titles were made available if students decided to choose them instead.

A few titles on the list were challenged because parents thought that they were too easy for minors to get their hands on them on the library shelves. These include:

Joy of Sex by Alex Comfort
Sex for Busy People: the Art of the Quickie for Lovers on the Go by Emily Dubberly
Lesbian Karma Sutra by Kat Harding
Mastering Multiple Position Sex by Eric Garrison
The Joy of Gay Sex by Charles Silverstein

In most of these cases, the library involved decided to implement special library cards for minors which would only allow children to check out restricted titles with parents’ permission rather than remove the books from their catalog. I’m sorry to report that I will not be reading these titles as part of the challenge, partially because my library owns only Joy of Sex for whatever reason, partially because of the massive Check Out Embarrassment Factor (no, librarians are not immune), and also because I am way more interested in the children’s/YA titles on the list. Also, I will not be looking at:

Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, which was “pulled from the Menifee, California Union School District [this year] because a parent complained when a child came across the term ‘oral sex’. Officials said the district is forming a committee to consider a permanent classroom ban of the dictionary.”

Maybe it’s been awhile since these people were kids, because I’m shocked that they can’t remember that looking up dirty words is practically what the dictionary is for until you start studying for the SATs and need to know what adjuration means.

Anyway, I’m sure I will think up other credible excuses why I can’t read things as this project progresses. Each review will include a brief summary, why it was challenged, if I think it really should have been, and a mostly fabricated list of other reasons why I think the book might offend you (including awful cover art). I will try to include quotes of the juicy parts so you don’t even have to read it for yourself to find them!

Last School Year Ever: Why My Week Has Sucked

Sorry about not posting yesterday; this week has been like a perfect storm of small amounts of tragedy that mix together to make a Long Island Iced Tea of despair.

–The bus route is going through its awkward teenage years, trying to reinvent itself, but remaining confused and unsure of what its peer group wants. At least, that’s how I’m interpreting its persistent, erratic behavior. The first day it was just massively late every time I tried to ride it, which is not that surprising on the first week of school. Then one afternoon at a random stop in the middle of the route, the bus driver told everyone to get off because she was done. It wasn’t an off-shift kind of thing–those happen at the end of the line–and we were all forced to wait FORTY MINUTES for the next bus–the two that should have come in the intervening time apparently having stopped off somewhere for after-school aperitifs. Or the happy times when the bus mysteriously fails to change direction at noon as it should, and I am forced to walk in a pack of my disconsolate cohorts along the side of the road. Walking in the sweaty, sweaty heat is kind of annoying, but not the end of the world. However, it’s throwing havoc to my carefully balanced schedule.

–My advisor is going on sabbatical the semester I’m supposed to be writing my Master’s Paper. Since I’m “aggressively competent” this will probably not adversely affect me to the extent it may some people, but it still means that I will 1) have to do a lot more work more quickly and 2) plead my case to the few remaining professors who care about things like public libraries or books way more aggressively than should be necessary. I mean, whose idea was it to only have two professors who are remotely interested in children and teens? I’m feeling the love.

–Once again, my classes only have vague relevance to my future career path. After yet another summer spent working in an actual library doing what I actually plan to pursue, this is even more aggravating than before.

–Our apartment is broken. We haven’t been able to use the shower for two days. Since Steven was going on one of his “if I wash my hair too much it’ll fall out” kicks even before that, it is a smelly, smelly world.

–Everything I eat or drink lately has a weird metallic taste. It took me forever to realize that I’m not dying of arsenic poisoning and that it’s just our dishwasher not washing the soap entirely off our dishes.

–I finished Hunger Games in like five hours yesterday and, despite loftily thinking myself immune to pop-lit trends, am now desperate to read the sequels. My choices are: wait three months on the library request list with all the other teen girls or pay money. I am in an agony of anti-BigBoxBookStore, cheapskate, frantic teen girl indecision.

–Steven keeps beating me at our jury rigged two-person version of Settlers of Catan. My honor is furious.

Hopefully I will at least be able to sort out the last two today.

Last School Year Ever: The Pregame

So, if all goes as planned, this should be my last school year ever. I am super excited. 18 years straight is too long to spend writing papers, dealing with group project drama, and researching things I don’t care about and will never use. I’m looking at you, ENGL 326. Is it hard to go back? Yes. Luckily, I’ve got the drill down and know just how to get pumped for Last School Year Ever.

Step 1: Supplies
Clearly school supplies are a major factor into determining your daily mood, not to mention who in class is the coolest. Remember how long it took to pick out even one spiral notebook in elementary school? Especially if you were totally obsessive like me and had to make sure it coordinated with your trapper keeper. Too many grad students forget the importance of cheerful, exciting school supplies and go with cheap, plain composition notebooks, not realizing that it will make every day in class taking notes completely boring. Well, not me. Not this year. After a grueling 15-minute decision process at Target’s school supply aisle, I decided on this one:

I wanted one that was all glitter, but a 12-year-old beat me to the last one

I literally cannot wait for the first day of class to take JUICY GOSSIP library science notes. Meghan has suggested that I forget the whole notes thing and turn it into my very own Burn Book, but she clearly hasn’t realized the way I take notes.

Also, for holding copies of syllabi and important papers:

A sparkly cupcake folder. Only the best.

I am one sparkly feather pen away from being the best grad student ever.

Step 2: Fortify your strength
I suggest this recipe:

1. Buy some chicken and salsa.
2. Put them in a crockpot!
3. Cook for 3-4 hours.
4. Serve over rice!

I call it "Salsa Chicken". Super tasty!

Step 3: Celebrate!
Nothing puts you in a celebration mood like vaguely literary wine on clearance at Harris Teeter!

Turns out, there was a reason it was on clearance

Humble Fail

We all know how much I love Humble. It’s Houston’s first line of defense from any invading army, who will have a pretty hard time getting by all those strip malls and car dealerships. Aside from being made of concrete and the childhood home of Steven Wiggins, Humble is lately home to the Humble Teen Lit Festival at Atascocita High School. January of 2011’s main headliner: New York Times bestselling author, Ellen Hopkins! Until a middle school librarian riled up some parents, who thought that Hopkins’ books would be Harmful To the Children and effectively got her Uninvited. Classy, Humble.

Hearing about this, other authors lined up to appear started dropping out in protest, including Pete Hautman, Matt de la Pena, Tera Lynn Childs, and Melissa de la Cruz. Other authors like Chris Crutcher and Jane Yolen have said that they WISH they had been invited, so they too could drop out. The Internet is freaking out about it, but I’m surprised there’s been no mention of it in any newspapers (that I can find). I guess the H-Chron is only interested in stories about animals, and everyone else is pretty used to this sort of thing happening to Ellen Hopkins.

Which is really a shame because her books are awesome. They’re written in verse, and usually about subjects affect teens like sex, drugs, religious intolerance, and abuse. It’s obvious why parents would want to protect their delicate teenage flowers from this, right? IT MENTIONS DRUGS which clearly teens have never heard of until reading one of these books. But Hopkins’ books go nowhere near glamorizing drug use; if anything, they present a stark, real message of the consequences–but without the After School Special tone that so often makes teens dismiss such works. After reading many of her books, I feel slightly queasy and drained, just at the thought of being in the same situations as her characters. I think if I were five years younger, the effect would be even more dramatic. Ellen Hopkins gets letters all the time from teens saying her books made them realize they needed to change their lives for the better.

I really feel bad for the teens of the “few” (the reports never say how many) parents pushed to have Hopkins uninvited. It’s likely that just going to public school has made them more knowledgeable about the subjects in Hopkins’ books than their parents realize, but I hate for anyone to have to make life decisions (whether to have sex, whether to take drugs, how to deal with abusive relationships) with only vague ideas about details and consequences. It drives me crazy when people try to shield their kids from the outside world to the point of incompetence and an inability to function in the real world, but, as parents, that’s they’re choice. What’s NOT their choice is to do the job of other parents who might take a more pragmatic, open view. I’m glad when I was younger, my parents trusted me enough to make my own decisions about what to read, and I think I’m a stronger person for it.

To read more about this issue, here is the School Library Journal article and the Houston Press article. The comments are pretty entertaining on both. Also, Ellen Hopkins discusses it on her blog.

Things That Spell Our Doom: Library Annoyances Edition

Little known fact: Freshman year, I liked the Wiess Servery. Shocking, I know. I liked the waffle machine–basically any part of breakfast–and I didn’t mind things like Servery Salt Soup or “brownies” that were made of stale cereal lightly coated in chocolate or dinner made from leftover breakfast. These things just didn’t bother me all that much. Fast forward to senior year, when the mere sight of Recycled Egg Soup would send me off on a rant so longwinded that I would often forget to eat anything at all. Fast forward to now, when I don’t remember why it pissed me off so much; it was the same economizing that I do all the time. The same with the Sid Music. Every Friday afternoon Sid Rich would blast music across campus. Freshman year, I was okay with that. It seemed like a nice way to start the weekend as I walked back from class. By senior year, it filled me with undirected rage. Okay, partially because I’d gotten smart enough not to have class on Fridays, so was usually taking an afternoon nap when it started blaring. I would mutter about how presumptuous it was to assume that everyone wanted to be annoyed with inescapable loudness, to just assume that everyone shared their taste in music, and make my escape to the relative peace of Humble, home of Steven Wiggins and the Houston dump.

Okay, maybe that last one was a bad example because I still think that one of the privileges of independence is never being forced to listen to random strangers’ music again. But, anyway, my point is, it’s easy for seemingly small, inconsequential things to gradually become terribly annoying if left long enough. Natch the library is no different.

Annoying Thing #1: This is not the grocery store, give me your GD library card.
It surprises me that more than half of the patrons I deal with in any given day come up to me, stack their mountains of books in neat, time-consuming piles on my desk, and then stare at me like I’m an idiot. “This stupid newb librarian,” I imagine them thinking. “She should have started on the first stack while I was laboriously piling the second and third for her. I curse her and all of her descendants for holding me up.”
“Do you have your card?” I say politely.
“Oh!” they cry, surprised (that they would need such a thing? At the LIBRARY? Surely you jest!) and begin digging around in their purse.
This happens at least twelve times a day, mostly with people who seem to use the library regularly, so you’d think they’d know the drill. At first, this didn’t bother me that much. It was mean to just assume that everyone, even people who use the library regularly, would also know that I have to scan a card first before I do anything. Then, slowly, it started to annoy me because they seemed shocked that they needed their library card AT ALL. I didn’t give it to you because I love non-recyclable plastic, my friends. It’s true that a library card isn’t technically necessary for checking out books. I can look up accounts by last name. I guess it’s possible that library patrons expect me to know their names by heart so that I can look up their accounts the moment I see them to be rid of all this cumbersome card-producing business. My other theory is that people mistakenly believe the library is like a store, where they scan all your purchases and only ask for your credit card at the end. After all, children almost NEVER forget. This mollified my irrational anger, somewhat. But I still get irrationally annoyed when the 20th person in a day is shocked when I ask for a library card. I’m pretty lucky that this is my main annoyance.

Annoying Thing #2: Sorry, can I direct you to the nearest elementary school?
Another question I get asked a lot: “When does the class start?”
I pause, trying to remember if there’s any classes at the library today. Then, realization dawning, “You mean… toddler storytime?”
This by itself, not that annoying. Even being referred to as a teacher, not that irritating, if a little confusing. It’s when I have to field complaints like “I’m not sure my preschooler is learning to read from storytime. You aren’t doing a very good job of teaching phonics” or “How educational IS this craft about alligators?”. Natch any program at the library is going to be somewhat educational, but I’m not a reading teacher. I’m not even a school library media specialist. I am a librarian (sort of) and I will during story times I will teach your toddler animal noises and that puppets are shy and will only come out when you’re quiet. Storytimes encourage reading, they don’t teach it.

The Most Annoying Thing Of All: Shoes With Squeakers
Squeak. Squeak. Squeak. Squeak. Squeak.
Is someone abusing a squeaky toy? Why is it coming closer? Is it a dog eviscerating a chew toy?
NO IT’S A CHILD WITH SQUEAKERS IN THE HEELS OF HIS SHOES.
I mean, I get that children get lost a lot, and these sure as hell make them easy to find. They are also possibly the single most annoying thing I have ever encountered. I assume the parents just stop hearing it after awhile, but for me each squeak is scraping away at my soul. People stare at me, silently ordering me to do my job and make the noise stop. I am not sure how to tell a kid to take off his shoes because this is a library. Seriously. If someone you hate has a child, this should be your baby gift. Except probably the parents will be blithely unaware of their mind-destroying powers, having already become immune to persistent, annoying sounds with the birth of their child, and will feel no shame at all in taking them to definitively quiet places like the library wearing these exciting new shoes. Then they will be shocked that they need their library card and complain about educational values in Curious George and I will die slowly inside.

Dream Interpretation #2

Dream #1
I dreamt that Taylor Johnson and two other guys I didn’t know burst into my apartment with guns and demanded all of our valuables. I tried to explain to Taylor and his friends—whom he insisted were his new street gang despite the fact that they were wearing polo shirts and had really gelled hair—that I didn’t have any valuables, but he didn’t listen. Then Steven distracted him by exhaustively telling him the plot of a Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode (which he will actually do in real life also, especially when we are out with normal people, I think because he enjoys being kicked under the table) while I ran in the other room to call the police. For some reason, the woman on the other end wanted me to describe their outfits in minute detail, and when I finally got back, Taylor’s “gang” had loaded up our “valuables” in a bunch of cardboard boxes. Most of the boxes contained kick boards and dice, so I was okay with that, but for some reason when they started piling up my cookbooks, I was ready to FIGHT TO THE DEATH. Then Taylor sighed and said, “Well, I guess since we were sort of friends in college or whatever I will just buy them off you” and gave me $20.

Interpretation:
Taylor Johnson clearly represents THE PAST and his attempts to steal boxes of things that may or may not be my possessions represent my letting go of past relationships/places/memories. The kick boards probably represent me trying to Make It On My Own without any helpful crutches like parents or equally mothering educational institutions (Rice had MAID SERVICE, what was that about?). The dice probably represents me giving up a gambling habit so repressed that even I don’t know about it.

Dream #2
I was dogsitting for some unknown person who lived in the middle of the country and owned two houses right next to each other. The dog was maybe a small bear and could talk. It demanded that I cook it elaborate meals while it watched reruns of “Friends”. When I finally got it to go to bed, I went to the smaller of the two houses to take a shower. SUDDENLY I was chased out of the house and around the yard by a swarm of deadly, deadly bees, finally escaping into the larger house where the dog helped me secure all the doors and windows. The rest of the dream was the dog and I plotting how to sneak into the other house while the bees were distracted so that I could retrieve my shampoo because, in the dream, it was apparently my most valuable possession.

Interpretation:
I care too much about my hair. And have started to internalize all the Clifford I deal with at work.

Seriously, if this dog were real, it would only be interested in rampaging, not cuddling.

Web Browser Drama and Standards Compliance

On Friday I had not one, but TWO great ideas for blog posts. I swear, you would have been blown away by my insight and calculated wit. I was pretty excited to be updating WITHOUT FAIL for the first time in a long while (most days, I’m just excited to be keeping my rep as a pathological liar). Unfortunately, when I tried to log onto my blog, nothing happened. It led to an entirely blank screen. My immediate reaction was that someone secretly jealous of my blogging semi-success had deleted the entire back end. Though Steven was upstairs working from home, I decided to send him a tech support email in the manner to which he is accustomed to receiving such complaints:

MY BLOG WON’T LET ME SIGN IN TO IT!!!! I TRIED CLICKING THINGS AND IT DIDN”T WORK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT DO I DO???? PLEASE HAVE THE PROBLEM FIXED BY THE TIME I AM DONE TYPING THIS EMAIL KTHXBYE

Then, while I waited for him to respond, I remembered that I am not actually a fifty-seven-year-old small business owner who thinks the Internet is contained in a single small box kept under close guard in Switzerland. So I rashly blamed Google Chrome and tried it in Firefox. Nothing. Then, just to make absolutely, positively sure, I tried it in Internet Explorer.

And it worked. I was livid. As I explained to Steven in the next email “DESPITE DATING YOU I DO HAVE SOME STANDARDS”. I spent about half an hour being angry and not speaking to Steven over the indignity of the thought of having to use IE. Then I decided I might as well before I totally forgot my ideas for a blog post. This soon prompted another email:

Now I can’t tell if IE is just the shittiest browser ever, or if it’s not working there either.

Sometimes these things are impossible to tell.

Steven eventually fixed the problem by moving me from hosting on NearlyFreeSpeech, which apparently has some trouble with WordPress, to bluehost. I was somewhat mollified. If he had mentioned anything like Go Daddy at this point, I would have angrily broken off the engagement on the spot.

Girl’s gotta have SOME standards. Some of mine are:

1) I must have the prettiest (though not necessarily the longest) hair.
2) A foot injury is the ONLY acceptable excuse for not dancing with me when Lady Gaga comes on.
3) Just because you are a web designer does not mean that you can technologically pull one over on me so don’t even try.

At my cousin’s beautiful wedding this weekend, I attempted to make Steven dance with me to almost every song in an attempt to forge the Cheesy Prom Memories neither of us have, but he would always have some excuse like “I don’t know how to dance to this song” or “It’s not in 3/4 time; why can’t you hear it?” or “Everyone would look at us”. Clearly he was not going to move unless he could do his well-choreographed waltz moves he learned in Ballroom Dancing LPAP. I tried to convince him that you really can just kind of stand out there and flail to a beat, but he wouldn’t hear it. Finally, when Lady Gaga came on I screamed “STEVEN! IF YOU DO NOT DANCE WITH ME TO THIS SONG, I WILL BREAK OFF OUR ENGAGEMENT RIGHT NOW!” And, to his credit, he is not that bad at flailing to a beat.

I also recently cut my hair. Solely for attention.

It’s good to know that, unlike most versions of IE, Steven remains fairly standards compliant.

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