Something to Speak For

There are a lot of things that piss me off while simultaneously making me want to cry.

Animal abuse.

Child abuse.

Racism.

Sexism.

And one of my personal I-Despise-This-In-Particular-s:

Censorship.

In North America, every September school boards hold what are basically civilized book burnings, where they pick and choose from On High what books are suitable for our impressionable youth to intake.

This year, one of the targets is Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson.

I don't know why I haven't written about Speak before, but now I have to. People like El Ignoramus, otherwise known as Wesley Scroggins, have to be stood up to, or we will all be reading nothing but Millie Buys a Dress.

Speak is about a girl named Melinda, who is raped the summer before ninth grade. She is so traumatized, she cannot speak. She loses her friends. And she is all alone, trying to deal with something that no-one ever should.

Mr. Scroggins (known from here on as El Ignoramus, or EI) is saying that Speak, with its two sex scenes, is like pornography.

Okay, let's rewind. The sex scenes in Speak are in no way designed to get someone "hot and bothered". They are about RAPE. They are scenes of violation. Abuse.

There is nothing enjoyable about them.

Speak is a voice for all victims of abuse. It has given those who cannot speak a chance to be heard, in a way that they cannot.

Recently, a girl was gang raped by seven young men while up to a dozen people watched. She was drugged, and pictures were taken of the rapes, then plastered all over the Internet.

Girls her age are saying it was her fault, that she was on drugs, that she was willing.

That youth are so horribly ignorant on issues like consent and assault is frightening, and raises important questions about what our generation is being taught about sex. Speak is an important educating tool to talk about these issues, to teach and to learn. Banning it is like putting a gag in every victim's mouth.

Please read Speak. Read it in public, at school, in your home.

Read it sitting in front of the offices of ignoramuses like Scroggins.

Fight back by reading, and learning, and teaching.

Pissed off and sad,

AT/RR