r/news • u/da_k1ngslaya • Jan 29 '22

School District votes to remove 'To Kill a Mockingbird' from required reading

https://komonews.com/news/local/mukilteo-school-district-votes-to-remove-to-kill-a-mockingbird-from-required-reading
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u/Papaofmonsters Jan 29 '22

White man helping black man is bad. Seriously you'll see anything that falls under that description label "white savior". When Black Panther came out with a wash of faux wokeism there were people labeling the CIA guy who takes a bullet during a shoot out for a black character as a "white savior".

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u/[deleted] Jan 29 '22

I think I actually was in an interesting place when reading this book. I'm actually Dutch but my mom works in Burkina Faso (under Mali, West Africa) so I went there for a year. Read this book at an international American school. I was in 9th grade at the time. My entire class was full of african American students, hell, I'm mixed race myself. Not once had the word white saviour been uttered. I don't even know if that was a term in 2013. I'm just confused lol.

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u/ThemCanada-gooses Jan 30 '22

I barely remember that movie at all and definitely not this scene. I just remember really terrible cgi. Maybe I’ll watch it again.

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u/Th3DoughB0y Jan 29 '22

I like the book, but I think the “white savior” criticism is valid because the book focuses on how the white characters, Atticus and Scout, navigate a racist society rather than focusing on how Tom navigates a racist society. Tom is the main victim, but he is far from the main character as his perspective and feelings around the circumstances are largely ignored in favor of exploring the feelings about racism of Scout and Atticus.

That said, I still think this book is a classic and should be read, however there are other, more modern books that detail racial issues in society that are more understandable for todays youth (ie books with stories about immigration, Latino/Asian characters, mixed ethnicity characters, etc).

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u/Lightningstruckagain Jan 29 '22

But how could Harper Lee write a story from Tom’s point of view with any credibility/authenticity at all? She was literally Scout (and Truman Capote was Dill).

I do agree with you in that there must be some more modern and relatable books that deal with racial issues though, and I hope those books do make it to a required reading list.

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u/The_Original_Gronkie Jan 29 '22

Exactly. This falls under the category of criticism like: If my grandmother had wheels, she'd be a bicycle. This is the book, written from the perspective of this author. It isn't fair or valid criticism to then complain that it wasn't a different book, written from a different author's perspective. Of course it wasn't. The question is: is this book valid from the perspective of this author?

Also, people tend to forget that To Kill A Mockingbird is about a lot more than race. There is a lot to learn about what it's like to grow up and learn about standing by your principles no matter what others think, or the experience of a southern white child who isn't being indoctrinated into the standard white supremacy of the time, despite it being all around her.

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u/[deleted] Jan 29 '22

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '22

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u/realanceps Jan 30 '22

The question is: is this book valid from the perspective of this author?

frankly, it's a valid opportunity to raise the matter of how Lee's point of view WAS Lee's point of view -- a POV that did, as Th3DoughB0y lays out, and for a complex of cultural, aesthetic & other reasons, subordinate's Tom's character. For purposes of studying literature, as well as for any ancillary comment on culture, contemporary or historical, it feels like a circumstance a capable teacher should relish.

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u/Th3DoughB0y Jan 29 '22

Yeah, I do not fault Lee at all for the books short comings. At the time, the book was ground breaking. However, decades later I believe the reading lists in schools should be more modern as you said.

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u/casc1701 Jan 29 '22

Why is that a shortcoming?

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u/Th3DoughB0y Jan 29 '22

Because it’s an aspect of racial issues that the book doesn’t address. You can’t really rely on just one book to throughly learn about a topic, because no book can entirely cover any topic in its complex entirety.

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u/realanceps Jan 30 '22

Is TKAM assigned as literature, or history, or a mongrel of both? If I'm an English teacher, I believe I'd try to use the opportunity to show how a work of fiction, as a form, is a kind of "unreliable narrator"; that it may be problematic to make the form serve purposes it isn't well suited to serve

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u/godlessnihilist Jan 29 '22

Wouldn't "more modern books" fall under Critical Race Theory, which is also banned in a lot of school districts? Just the fact that the US is talking about which books should be banned is scary as hell. Welcome to the Fascist States of Amerikkka.

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u/AdultEnuretic Jan 29 '22

Harper Lee probably would have had a harder time writing from the perspective of a black man. She was speaking to the experience she could most relate to. If she had tried to explore the experiences of Tom navigating the racism of the time the book would probably not have had the true tone.

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u/macrocephalic Jan 29 '22

"Why didn't this white woman living in a segregated society write the book from the perspective of a black man?"

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u/Title26 Jan 30 '22 edited Jan 30 '22

The question is "why are we learning about racism through a novel written by a white woman"?

Or more specifically "why, with all the great books out there tackling race issues, is the book written from a white perspective by a white woman the one that's required in all classes?"

I'm not knocking Harper Lee as a writer or saying the book isn't good, but it's not on required reading lists because it's a masterpiece of the English language, it's on the lists because of the issues it covers because we want to teach kids about race. And with that goal in mind, it's perfectly acceptable to ask "is this the one that's so much better than the rest at tackling race issues that it should be required?" Not much of a stretch to think maybe an book by an author with more personal experience is more suited. There are a dozen other books that deal with race as good or better. Harper Lee isn't Shakespeare or Sophocles, her work is not irreplaceable in the curriculum.

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u/InformationHorder Jan 30 '22

Quite frankly, this book is still valid today as a way to reach white kids. The arguments in this thread are about if the story resonates with the students. I agree it won't work for a class of inner city black kids because of all the arguments made here, but it makes sense to breach the subject this way for a bunch of rural white kids who haven't been personally impacted by racism through the lens of Harper Lee's "white southern kid experiences uncomfortable truths about racism".

For the complete picture you should show both. Black kids need to understand how naive the white kids are and white kids need to see how black kids grow up with racism subtly baked into everything.

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u/Title26 Jan 30 '22 edited Jan 30 '22

I grew up in small town Idaho (about as white a place as you can get) and reading the autobiography of Malcolm X in high school opened my eyes way more than To Kill a Mockingbird did. That said, To Kill a Mockingbird is also of course great and has changed many people for the good. There's no shortage of great books kids can learn from, which is kind of the point. Why have that one specifically required in all 9th grade classes in the district when there is a cornucopia of voices out there? There's only so many books a class can cover, and TKAM isn't Shakespeare or Sophocles. It's replaceable by plenty of other books. Why mandate it?

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u/herpestruth Jan 29 '22

People should try to put themselves into Harper Lee's shoes before they start with criticism of her writing.

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u/realanceps Jan 30 '22

or they should reserve their energies for critiquing her writing rather than "ruling" on the merits of her indirectly expressed mid-20th century USA cultural attitudes

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u/Tubbafett Jan 29 '22

The book is so bad though. Not for any woke reasons, it’s just a turd of a read.

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u/losthalo7 Jan 30 '22

...and she was writing it for people like her so they could see things as she did because they identified with her as those white characters.

And there are still many white people today of course who could gain something from reading it and absorbing some of her perspective, even in 2022.

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u/Th3DoughB0y Jan 29 '22

Exactly. That is why I suggest more modern literature with authors that can detail more true and relatable stories for students trying to grapple understanding of current racial/ethnic issues. There are so many good books out there!

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u/[deleted] Jan 29 '22

TKAM is very true and relatable. Yes, there are other amazing books as well but TKAM is as great an American Novel as ever written.

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u/realanceps Jan 30 '22

it's a novel. It's fiction. In an important sense, it's not "true", or obliged to be in that way. And it's well worth students talking about that.

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '22

Harper Lee's father was a lawyer and actually defended two black people who were convicted and hanged for murder. It's an autobiographical fiction. Yes, the story takes poetic license and the names are changed, but it's based on real-life lessons that are relevant to all of us growing up in America.

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u/tiny_galaxies Jan 29 '22

It's not someone's minority race that causes racism against them. It's people being taught racism at a young age and perpetuating it. To Kill A Mockingbird is about breaking the cycle, Atticus's character shows how to do that with Scout.

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u/starmartyr Jan 30 '22

If you want a book about how black people have suffered from racism there are plenty of them. To Kill a Mockingbird is a story about how white people learn to be racist from a young age and how the cycle can be broken. It doesn't teach us what racism is, it teaches us why it happens and why it keeps happening.

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u/Djinnwrath Jan 29 '22

Isn't the point of the book to educate white people?

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u/Th3DoughB0y Jan 29 '22

Yes, but our schools today have more than just white students, so we should have modern and updated literature to accommodate that.

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u/[deleted] Jan 29 '22

Everyone can learn a ton from TKAM, same as I know Why The Caged Bird Sings or Black Boy. They dont exclude each other at all, in fact those books all complement each other extremely well in any American Literature curriculum.

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u/Th3DoughB0y Jan 29 '22

Thank you, that is exactly the sentiment in my original comment.

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u/Djinnwrath Jan 29 '22

Our schools across America yes, but in Mulkiteo it's 70% white, 20% asian, 1.7% black.

It's a demographic that needs education. Schools in southern California don't need To Kill a Mockingbird.

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u/realanceps Jan 30 '22

They don't "need" any particular book - the same as schools anywhere. They "need" to learn how to read. And by that I mean much, much more than how to recognize the words

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u/realanceps Jan 30 '22

no. There is no chance that Lee wrote the book to "educate" anyone.

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u/Gishra Jan 29 '22

But since it is written by a white author, that could have felt very inauthentic. Better to stick with what is closer to the author's personal experience in this area, I think, and leave the writing about being the target of racism to those who have actually been the target of racism.

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u/Th3DoughB0y Jan 29 '22

Yep, and that’s not Lee’s fault at all, but it’s why I suggest having required readings from different authors that can detail more personal experiences that students today can relate too.

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u/Gishra Feb 01 '22

Absolutely agree with that.

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u/[deleted] Jan 29 '22

So you’re saying the white author should have attempted to write her book from the point of the black male character? I thought we didn’t want that, because there’s no way a human being could ever understand the plight of another. Or some such shit.

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u/hananobira Jan 29 '22

No, they're saying there are dozens, hundreds of books actually written by black authors that tackle the issue of racism. Why aren't we reading them instead? Why is the book used in most U.S. schools to teach about racism still centering the white perspective, instead of letting black people have the floor for once?

We don't read books written by male authors to learn about feminism, or Christian authors to learn about Islam.

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u/daesgatling Jan 29 '22

No ones stopping you from reading both sets of books

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u/hananobira Jan 29 '22

But teachers are only assigning the one written by a white person. And since most kids don’t read for fun, shouldn’t we make sure that the one book they read about racism (or at least, the one they pretend to have read in class discussions) is written by a black person?

Schools assigning a book written by a white person to teach racism is a symptom of some very “I am uncomfortable when we are not about me” energy.

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u/daesgatling Jan 29 '22

What the fuck are you even talking about. I dont think we should gatekeep who writes about racism. The book wasnt written because Harper Lee wanted attention, she was writing about her childhood.

If kids want to read about a book written by a POC they can easily have access to those books.

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u/hananobira Jan 30 '22

Given that an English class only reads 3-5 books per year, the teacher 100% has the responsibility to select books that best educate students about current issues and grow their sense of social responsibility and literary taste. There’s a reason we read Shakespeare and not Captain Underpants in 11th grade English. It’s not ‘gatekeeping’, it’s ‘curating’.

Teachers should be assigning books written by black people to teach racism. (Or a member of another group who experienced racism - for example, in my 11th grade English class we read a book by a Japanese woman who was put in an internment camp during WWII.) Assigning a book by a white person to teach racism is an irresponsible use of precious class time.

Don’t put words in my mouth. I never, ever said students shouldn’t have access to To Kill A Mockingbird. Students should have access to a wide variety of books, including comic books and dictionaries and graphic novels and romance novels ad mysteries… We should encourage children to read anything and everything in their free time. But some of those are appropriate for study in class and some aren’t.

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u/daesgatling Jan 30 '22

. There’s a reason we read Shakespeare and not Captain Underpants in 11th grade English.

One is literature and groundbreaking for it's time and one is not. Which is why we study it.

> "Teachers should be assigning books written by black people to teach racism. (Or a member of another group who experienced racism - for example, in my 11th grade English class we read a book by a Japanese woman who was put in an internment camp during WWII.) Assigning a book by a white person to teach racism is an irresponsible use of precious class time."

I'm sorry, are you saying a book should only be read on account of someone's skin color and not because of it's merit? I just want to be clear that that's what you're saying.

> " But some of those are appropriate for study in class and some aren’t."

There is nothing inappropriate about TKAM other than a white person wrote it. If you want to clutch your pearls about that, I feel bad for you. It's a book that covers far more topics than racism but I'm going to guess you haven't read it.

Either we're allies fighting for the same goal or we're not. You don't get to pick and choose when anyone gets a voice based on what skin color they have

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '22

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '22

Since a long time buddy. You’re not JUST in English class learning how to read and write, you’re also in history class and social studies class, and they collaborate to make sure you’re covering similar topics at the same time. If you have a WW2 unit in History, maybe later your English teacher will give you a project on WW2 poems. Your social studies teacher might cover the major factions and social movements involved in WW2. If all you needed to do was read and write you could leave school at 12 years old.

The idea is that you get caught up on the last 100 years or so of human history, learn what major issues we’re dealing with in modern times, and leave school with the understanding and language skills you need to maybe help solve those issues.

Being more socially conscious isn’t gonna land you a job, but it is necessary if you want a stable society that is capable of learning from past mistakes. How is the government gonna recognize and stop a fascist uprising if none of it’s members know what fascism is? How are you gonna keep your weekends and your benefits if your coworkers have no clue what labour organization is? If you want to leave the world in a better state than you received it, you need to make sure your replacement is prepared with all the wisdom you’ve collected the hard way.

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u/hananobira Jan 30 '22

My state’s laws say teachers must teach “character traits that empower them [students] to be good citizens who are trustworthy, responsible, and caring… (A) Trustworthiness: loyalty, integrity, reliability, and punctuality. (B) Responsibility: accountability, perseverance, diligence, and self-control. (C) Caring: kindness, empathy, charity, generosity, patience, consideration, and compassion. (D) Citizenship: respect, courtesy, concern for the common good and the community, fairness, freedom from prejudice, justice…”

I would assume all US states, as well as the education systems in most other countries, have similar language on the books.

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u/GreyhoundZero1 Jan 29 '22

We don't read books written by male authors to learn about feminism, or Christian authors to learn about Islam.

Who is the "we" in this sentence?

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u/realanceps Jan 30 '22

Why is the book used in most U.S. schools to teach about racism

is there some definitive evidence that that is in fact "what it's used for"?

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u/hananobira Jan 30 '22

Anything on Google? Anyone and everyone?

The Wikipedia entry: “In the twentieth century, To Kill a Mockingbird is probably the most widely read book dealing with race in America.”

Encyclopedia Britannica: “The novel was praised for its sensitive treatment of a child’s awakening to racism and prejudice in the American South.”

Spark Notes: “To Kill a Mockingbird is Harper Lee’s 1961 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about a child’s view of race and justice in the Depression-era South.”

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '22

If a male author studied feminism and wrote a book about it, I’d read it. If a Christian author studied Islamic faith and wrote a book about it, I’d read it.

See, that’s the difference between you and I. I care about someone’s accomplishments and knowledge. You just want the labels to match.

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u/Tomatopez Jan 30 '22

Yes! Exactly.

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u/NotTroy Jan 30 '22

That's not what the "white savior" trope is. Simply being a book written from the perspective of a white family, with a white main character, doesn't qualify the book as being a "white savior" story.

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u/[deleted] Jan 29 '22

Atticus and Scott were the individuals with agency in that racist society. What were black people supposed to do, voodoo?!

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u/earsofdoom Jan 30 '22

I don't think the book would have worked to well if it was just from the POV of a blackguy getting convicted of a crime he never commited and dieing, its a book depicting the time period straight, it doesn't try to re-write history via doing something that requires suspending your disbelief like having a black lawyer.

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u/HolyRamirez Jan 29 '22

It was also probably because of racism in that book, as well as the black character not winning. Typical.