Read Across America -Dr. Seuss

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious, is there a legal reason they cannot revise the books to remove the offensive terms and images? That way, kids could continue to enjoy them, without the offensive and inappropriate parts.

I was wondering the same thing. It seems like most of the comments have to deal with the artistic depictions. Couldn't those be changed?

I guess his heirs would have to give their permission, so I guess that's not what they want.

"Should we fix your drawings Suess's head?"

"Uh, do whatever you want, I'm super dead!"

(Hamilton)

LOL!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's called the slippery slope guys. It always starts somewhere...eventually the line will cross something YOU enjoy and it will no longer be socially acceptable. That is what people are protesting over.

Everything can be viewed as racist today, but these books were not written today. There's a context and time they were created in. Let history be. No one is perfect. No one is a futurist and can perceive what is not acceptable in 50 years. View these books as a way for us to start conversations and say, hey, that picture, not so great...but we don't do that anymore, so we can LEARN from the past, not erase it from existence. We left a communist country that experience this and do not want this here.

I'm not white, but I sure feel bad for everyone who is right now. What I fear this is eventually going to do is to generate an even larger pushback from white identified groups who now feel like they need to gather and voice the protection for their own "kind" if you will. Appreciate your neighbors and view everyone as individuals. None of this will end well. Remember for every action, there's is an equal reaction.

+1000 *Hispanic here... this cancel culture and extreme censorship is so disturbing.

[Anonymous]

Oh my goodness everyone Calm Down. Nothing was cancelled— it’s been “Read Across America” not Dr. Seuss specific in other places in the country for Years. MD moved it five years ago— where was the panic? No one is stopping you from reading or buying his books other than the literary estate of this man you’re busy revering...

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:These are the cancelled books:

'And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street', 'If I Ran the Zoo', 'McElligot's Pool', 'On Beyond Zebra!', 'Scrambled Eggs Super!', and 'The Cat's Quizzer'

Today is Geisel’s birthday and he is usually celebrated big time. He’s been cancelled by Biden! No mention of him whatsoever on a day when he is usually lauded as the giant of children’s literature that he is.

He was NOT a racist. How is it even racist to depict an Asian person in an Asian conical hat that is very culturally common and associated with Asians like cowboy hats are associated with Americans?

Geisel drew some ugly propaganda cartoons for adults during the pre WWII years to pay the bills and help push Americans toward the anti fascist war effort when Charles Lindbergh and others were pushing America First and happy to laud Hitler and his actions.

I am seriously astounded by the idiocy that is taking over American progressivism.

This is what I read this morning

As NPR's Code Switch team has reported:

"In And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, for example, a character described as Chinese has two lines for eyes, carries chopsticks and a bowl of rice, and wears traditional Japanese-style shoes. In If I Ran the Zoo, two men said to be from Africa are shown shirtless, shoeless and wearing grass skirts as they carry an exotic animal. Outside of his books, the author's personal legacy has come into question, too — Seuss wrote an entire minstrel show in college and performed as the main character in full blackface."

https://www.npr.org/2021/03/02/972777841/dr-seuss-enterprises-will-shelve-6-books-citing-hurtful-portrayals

So other than being slightly inaccurate, whats the big deal? My kids once brought home a book where a polar bear befriended a penguin (they live on opposite ends of the earth) but the book wasn't being cancelled!

I don't blame Biden for this. He's got bigger fish to fry. This is the stupid super-liberal activists that make all liberals look bad.

I don't know if penguins and polar bears are a good analogy for non-white people.
So you'd have no problem with cihldrens books portraying Jewish people and their exaggerated noses?

You are keying in on something important: leaving out racist caricatures Seuss books are all white characters and animals. Schools prefer to show books in which all students can see themselves , not just white kids. Then students who aren’t white see themselves in books too. Which is why the focus is coming off Seuss to more diverse texts and authors . It’s 2021, not 1937.

But the characters barely look human at all. Lots of yellow and green humanoid beings, like the Simpsons. But while we're at it, I find the Simpsons way more racist than Seuss.

And we don’t watch the Simpsons in school or traditionally spend a whole week on the Simpsons.

No, but if you are antiracist and you or your kids watch the Simpsons, you are extremely hypocritical. The point though is that race isn't discernible in many of Seuss's books. That said, I don't think lack of diversity is a compelling reason to exclude a book from the classroom.

The supposed ‘white’ characters in Seuss books resemble deformed aliens. I am offended because that’s not what I want to be portrayed as. I do not look like these characters. All white girls don’t look like Cindy Lu or whatever. Seriously, I really don’t GAF.

No. There are regular white kids like the kids in Cat in the Hat and the people in Mulberry Street. There are weird fuzzy aliens and made up animals. There are no Black, brown or Asian people portrayed in a regular not racist way though.

Who are brown people? No one seems to have an answer to this question.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oh my goodness everyone Calm Down. Nothing was cancelled— it’s been “Read Across America” not Dr. Seuss specific in other places in the country for Years. MD moved it five years ago— where was the panic? No one is stopping you from reading or buying his books other than the literary estate of this man you’re busy revering...

You really just don't get anything if you think it's providing revenue for his estate.. so tone deaf!

[Anonymous]

The sole offensive image in Mulberry Street was already modified with Seuss’s blessing before he died. It used to depict the person as yellow complected, he is now white. It used to say Chinaman and now says Chinese man. He is wearing a very common (still today) Asian conical hat, and eating from a bowl with chopsticks - shockingly racist, don’t you think?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The sole offensive image in Mulberry Street was already modified with Seuss’s blessing before he died. It used to depict the person as yellow complected, he is now white. It used to say Chinaman and now says Chinese man. He is wearing a very common (still today) Asian conical hat, and eating from a bowl with chopsticks - shockingly racist, don’t you think?

Mulberry Street was in the top ten children’s books in terms of sales before this cancellation by the Seuss Foundation- so all the posters claiming these books were already economic losers are just not right.

[Anonymous]

Saw a FB post about all this yesterday, of course they were posting Fox News report that Biden did not mention Dr. Suess in is proclamation. I tried to find Trump's proclamations (he apparently did them) but could not find a single one (did not look on gov sites). Anyway, we know what his opinion was of books (3 bullet points is enough for him, and a ghostwriter). The person who posted?--I was her babysitter when she was 10 and I was 16. She was an easy kid to sit for and she and her family are actually really cool people (very outdoors types, a lot of gardening and canning and foraging and hunting, her daughter is a national park ranger) but I hated the fact that their house had NO BOOKS when I babysat. None whatsoever. So it's just funny to see people who likely do not read at all up in arms because oh my god Dr. Suess! When have they EVER looked up the Read Across America reading lists? Never, that's when.

Then I looked at the reading list for read aloud books. Ramona the Pest is in there. So is Brown Bear Brown Bear What Do You See, which was one I read to my DS 30 years ago and had forgotten. And others.

I am so glad to have been discovering, in recent years, writers from all sorts of places and cultures that were basically absent in my white bread childhood America. How about we focus on those we can discover now?

[Anonymous]

Now do The Lorax.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I never liked Dr. Seuss - even as a kid - so I am ok with canceling it

The books that they are canceling are offensive so they should be discontinued. However, not everything you don't like should be canceled.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The sole offensive image in Mulberry Street was already modified with Seuss’s blessing before he died. It used to depict the person as yellow complected, he is now white. It used to say Chinaman and now says Chinese man. He is wearing a very common (still today) Asian conical hat, and eating from a bowl with chopsticks - shockingly racist, don’t you think?

I just don’t see the racism. Also, these are all more historical images. White men don’t wear top hats any more.