Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, March 24, 1992 TAG: 9203240435
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
It might upset you to learn your child had access to a book that includes steamily erotic descriptions of a woman and a carnal relationship; a story about a powerful man spying on a beautiful woman's bath, then contriving the death of her husband so he could take the widow for himself. Or material containing forms of a four-letter word you would not like your offspring to use; or graphic descriptions (and glorification) of violence.
All those things are in the Old Testament.
No fair, you may say: That's taking words and situations out of context. The Bible does contain frank descriptions, many of them involving sinful activities; but overall, it teaches values and morality. You must look at the entire work and its meaning.
Fine. Let's also apply that healthy standard to secular works assigned to pupils by schoolteachers. J.B. Lineberry, a Hillsville evangelist, has been circulating selected passages from "The Floatplane Notebooks" by North Carolina novelist Clyde Edgerton. Lineberry says these excerpts, from the book assigned to members of two 11th-grade English classes at Carroll County High School, are obscene.
His supporters plan to picket the school this week and are seeking dismissal of the teacher, Marion Goldwasser, and anyone else involved in approving the book for the classroom.
This is obscurantist nonsense. Worse; it is pernicious nonsense.
Put aside the fact that this is the latter part of the 20th century. That Goldwasser is Carroll County's teacher of the year. That she has been teaching English for 20 years, and that she has utterly no intention of subverting the morals of her charges or encouraging them to use dirty words. Eleventh-graders have already heard them all, and they also know what kind of actions fallible humans engage in; it is silly to suggest they be shielded from the world. They live in it.
Better by far that respected role models such as teachers bring certain topics and modes of conversation out of the restroom and foster frank discussion. Young people have plenty of opportunity to read and watch trash; teachers such as Goldwasser help acquaint them with literature, where three-dimensional characters not only act but also talk and think and respond to their surroundings. Thus exposed, many pupils want to read more and better books and stories, and they are enriched.
What is the corrupting influence in Carroll County? Not a book, but Lineberry and his book-banners and witch-hunters.
Who's a candidate for picketing, perhaps even for departure from the school system? Not Goldwasser, but her principal, Harold Golding.
This man who calls himself an educator gave in quickly to the clamor: "We recognize that the book does have some [vulgar] words in it, and it'll not be read again."
Shame on him. Meantime, keep the kids away from a few other books: 1 Samuel, 1 Kings and 2 Kings. They've heard the word, but it would be terrible if they read it.
by CNB