The article "The Bravest Girl in the world" in the upfront magazine is about a young girl who spoke out for girls having the right to go to school and learn. The girl's name was Malala Yousafzai and she was openly speaking about girls in Pakistan gaining the right to go to school. The Taliban did not agree with her views and on her way to school, the Taliban shot her. They shot her because of her gender and her views on the subject. They purposefully discriminated her gender so they could stay superior, showing how people do not care that other types of people are equal to them and that they deserved to be treated equally.

Inequality is a terrible thing that people who are different should not have to suffer through. This story is one of the many that show how unfair it is, and the issues that every type of different or discriminated against person is having around the world. In my life, everyone goes to school, but that is not true about all of the people around the world and it should be like that. This story shows the horror of discrimination through Malala's eyes and from a fair lens of the way the shooting worked. You learn about how unfair things are in Pakistan, and how people are denied some of the most basic rights.

Discrimination starts when a group of people want to feel and be more powerful than a different type of person, and they start to try to achieve that goal. However, the group of people really aren't better than all of the other people who are out there, they are just trying to convince themselves of it. Frances Wright said "Equality is the soul of liberty; there is, in fact, no liberty without it." If we claim to give everybody liberty, then we should all be considered equal.

The book Watchmen by Alan Moore is about a group of people who used to be superheroes, and some people are taking out all of their friends and killing them. The main character named Rorschach who is very quiet and able to sneak up on anyone. Somebody is picking off superheroes and very few people are actually taking this seriously. One of the main characters, Dr. Manhattan, is exiled and it shows how people are afraid of difference. The superheroes are disliked because of the fact that the police are having trouble with them.

When people are different, other types of people fear them. All types of discrimination are caused by differences, and this book is no different than all of the other books that deal with racism, religionism, or agism. These people are discriminated by because of all of their powers, when even though they are helpful, people still think that they do things like cause cancer. This book touches base on the origins of all of the types of discrimination when it talks about it.

In a perfect world, people care about each other no matter what their differences are. Mohatma Ghandi said "Be the change you wish to see in the world". This means that if we want people to be more forgiving, we have to do it ourselves. People who complain about other people but are not doing stuff by themselves are being utterly useless, and we cannot make moral changes without doing something by ourselves.

Flight by Sherman Alexie

The book flight by Sherman Alexie is about a young half Native-American orphan named Zits whois forced to fend for his self when his mother dies of breast cancer and his father ran away. He develops hatred for the people who take control over his life and gains a general hatred for everybody else. He does not trust anybody else and acts sinister and angry. He almost commits a mass murder, and is living with the emotional challenges when he is mysteriously sent back in time.

Power is treated as something only rich people get their hands, and is something that is treated as awful and not a thing that was created to help maintain order and peace. The people with power are the police, or anybody with guns who is going to use them When Justice, a caucasian boy who he would generally hate, gave him a gun, he became one of the characters with the most power in the book. Zits started to fell elated and bloated with power

This makes me uneasy, because guns have killed many innocent people who did not deserve to die, but this boy feels that whoever has this gun is the most powerful person. We are trying to limit the amount of deaths, and this boy believes that this deadly instrument is a good thing.

Ziits refused the Paintball gun and chose the gun. Does that mean that we are too squeamish about guns and killing and in a false utopia, or does it mean that he is a person who actually is a murderer. This story suggests that guns are used for power, and that killing is not such a major thing. The question I had constantly when reading this book was why the author used the gun to show status

Dear Ms Berner

Attempting to “purify” literature through book banning will have a negative affect on all Children or young adult readers. Only a kid knows the specific type of book that is good for the age group, and a parent’s or teacher’s job is not to attempt to figure out the type of book that is not right for the younger age group, so adults should not be the one to decide what is suitable for their child. Books will help the kid learn about the real world, instead of keeping them in a bubble that will burst eventually. While the adults are fretting over bad language, kids are enjoying the highly challenged books.

            When Ellen Hopkins, author of the book Crank, met a teenage girl who read her book, the girl burst into tears. The girl told Ms. Hopkins about how her life was changed because of her book. Crank was one of the books that you were considering banning. Although books are combating harsh subjects, it does give adults the right to remove it in order make a genre closer to their standards. Banning does not make the article any better; it simply just takes away an important reading option for the kids. Sherman Alexie, the writer of the book you are considering banning The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian recalled his encounters with many kids who wanted to be free, just like his book. He met a boy who was rich but still had a problem. His Father was forcing him off into the military against his will. The boy said, “I read your book, I want to be free, just like you.” This shows how even though a book may contain a harsh topic, it can help kids get hope, even in awful situations. Although these books may contain harsh topics, they help those affected by it. These books are the books that you want to ban, and yet, banning them would have no benefit on a child’s reading life.

            According to the ALA (The American Library Association), the book The Perks of Being a Wallflower has had many ban attempts on it. The reasons were that the book was “anti-family, drugs, homosexuality, offensive language, religious viewpoint, sexually explicit, suicide, unsuited to age group”. The book was removed from a public school library, and because of it, a small bookstore sold more than 5 times the amount of that particular book. Banning a book actually helps make it better known.  People have tried to manipulate reading so that kids would be stuck in a bubble until they were 20. This does not help kids grow up; it simply limits their future options in reading. A kid should be able to read the book of his choice, because he/she is the only person who can judge what he/she can read. Only a kid knows what type of book is best for himself, and although the adults believe they can understand it, attempting to ban it will make books a less important part of their lifestyle, because some of their favorite books are being banned by adults who can’t truly understand young adult literature.

            Meghan Cox Gurdon wrote a scathing article on how books are getting darker and darker. She claims that there are “Ever more appalling choices” and that publishers are “bulldozing coarseness and misery into children’s lives. She goes on to how these books are horrible for the children who read them and that anyone should have the right to prevent a child from reading these offerings. In contrast, these books actually don’t “bulldoze coarseness and misery into our lives”.  The book the chocolate war is constantly under fire because of its scenes of violence and cruelty. However, when I read this book, I was not unhappy because I read it. I empathized with the main character and tried to figure things out related to it. Mary Elizabeth Williams talks about her own childhood reading. “Many of those books were trashy as Hell, but we loved them anyway. Teenage books are not just wizards and vampire romances”. Ms. William’s point shows how important the fact that books are not supposed to be white fluff with a beautiful ending. These books actually do have meaning. The darkness in a book is what makes it different from children’s books, but at the same time, it is not an adult book because of the fact that the protagonist is a teenager and that it is made for young adults, not adults. Since the dark books are becoming bestsellers and very popular, banning them would not make young adult fiction any more pure.”

            All of these books mean a huge amount to young adults and many of them read these books in their spare time. Robert Cormier, author of many a controversial book said, “You seldom get a censorship attempt from a 14-year-old boy. It's the adults who get upset.” These books are not adult books; they are young adult books that only young adults can truly understand.

Blog post 5

In the book Gone, by Michael Grant, Young adults are treated like completely different types of people. The main character, Sam is treated as if he is a complex person who is 30 years old instead of being a 15 year old. I think this is because of the fact that he is one of the oldest kids in the area because of the “poof”. The poof was when everyone 15 and older simply disappeared and a barrier went up around a city. This makes me wonder if age only matters in relativity to othr ages instead of the specific age.

            Since all of the characters in the book are under 15, what a12 year old is much more old in comparison to the others. In the book, the main character sam says “soon everyone is going to realize that this town is going to need to change, and that they can’t just play video games anymore.” This shows how although by our standards, he is young, he is mature and strong when the oldest person is at the age of 14. This makes me wonder if it really makes sense to have age be a label for the things that people can do. Is it really that smart to stick a law in stone while a 16 year old could still be extremely mature.

            This book challenges the fact that we believe that someone is mature based on their age. This book treats the young adults like they are the oldest people alive at the time. It treats a 13 year old like a 35 year old instead because of the fact that they are very mature compared to all the other people at the time. The protagonist, Sam believes that he can make a difference in comparison to all the other people and show that his age does not define his maturity. The book made me think about if people should be held back by their parents.

Reading response 10/9, late due to Internet problems and my bar mitzvah

In an article in called Watching You by Patricia Smith, in the upfront magazine, the author seems to want to make you challenge what is right and what is wrong. The article is about how the government is spying on you via your electronics, and if this surveillance is okay, or is it an intrusion upon privacy. It tries to make you question your opinion on a subject of privacy versus safety. It makes you wonder why Edward Snowden chose to break the news to all of the country.

            I believe that the author wants you to think that this is a major issue. In my opinion, you really should not have anything to hide from the government that is something that is damaging. The article talks about how the surveillance helped find the people who were trying to kill many of the other people.  This article made me wonder where the line should be drawn between the two. sides of the argument. I think that it is okay if they see who you call, but not be able to listen in on the call or get the picture of the person you are skyping. The government does not need to see your actual body, they just need to see if you are suspicious.

            In the article, they mention Edward Snowden, who is a person who leaked all of this information to the public. In my opinion this man is not a traitor because of the fact that he unveiled secrecy. Knowledge is important, and if we do not know what the government s doing right now, who knows what else they are hiding from us. This part shows that the fact that they are watching us is necessarily bad, but it is something to think about.

  In the books I am reading, I have found that young adults are treated much differently in each book.  In divergent, The main character was treated as if she was a mature adult. She was given many responsibilities that most 16 year olds would not have. She confronts death so many times that she becomes more brave than anybody else. She is stripped of her childhood and very different because of her unfortunate experiences.

                                                                                                                             

However in all of her experiences, she becomes a much better person. She struggles with the fact that she was forced to kill a good friend of hers, and is haunted by it. She ends up being attacked in so many different ways and having issues because she is different. Everyone is scared of somebody who is different. This is shown with every type of racist out there, or anyone who is afraid of another people.

In the Chocolate War, the main character decided to rebel against the the whole school. The author treats him as hopeless, and despondent boy who does not know what he is getting into. In the end he got beat up and ended u having to go to the emergency room. The principal watched and did not care. He was shown to be not the smartest kid. However, he seems more mature than the main character in Divergent

The two books treat the young adults very differently. In one, The kid seems so much smarter and strong, but the other story ends up with the kid being beat up because he messed up. He only had 2 adults on his side, and one was attempting to make him fail his class, because someone stole his homework.                                                                                           

Faithful Elephants

The book “Faithful Elephants” by Yukio Tsuchiya shows that war does more damage than the stuff it does on the battlefield. During the story, there are three elephants that are condemned to an execution, because of World War 2. The Government commanded that the zookeepers kill all the dangerous zoo animals in Tokyo and the Ueno zoo. This meant that all the elephants John, Tonky, and Wanly were all executed.

            All three elephants were starved to death because they found no way to poison the elephants. Every zookeeper was shocked and had a huge emotional blow that would hurt them badly. The keeper said “you poor, pitiful elephants, and paced in front of the cage”. The keeper was seriously hurt by this sudden tragedy and was very unhappy. This happens during war, but we still attack other countries without considering the huge toll this can take.

            When the keeper gave Tonky and Wonky food, and all of the other keepers pretended not to see, and yet, it would be tossing aside the governments orders. All the keepers cared about the elephants and let the offending keeper get away with feeding the elephants. The keepers all care and they all felt the loss, because of a war that they had no choice in. The war did so much more damage than just the bombs being dropped. Every one hoped the elephants would survive longer, but they died.

            In Faithful Elephants, the author encourages you to think before you believe that war is the solution. It shows how damaging war is and how dangerous it can be to everyone’s emotions. This story challenges everyone’s decision