Hey everyone! It’s really been a while! Don’t worry, though, I have a lot more blogs coming in the near future that I hope I’ll be able to post!
But, quoting JaidenAnimations, it’s been a while since I had a story to tell, but, I HAVE A STORY TO TELL!
So, during June, my mom, my sister (Solus aka Abby) and I went to Half-Price Books (a bookstore, if you couldn’t tell). Not only was it to buy books for my sister (see her blog here!), but also to buy some records for my new vinyl record player! After we went to the checkout, the cashier offered us a reading challenge: fill out a reading bingo card. Each requirement is in each square (read a book you loved as a kid, read something outside of your comfort zone, etc), and when you read a book that goes with that requirement, you cross it out! So Solus and I accepted the challenge.
This then led me to a certain square: “Read a banned or challenged book.”
When I saw that square, this got me curious. The only “banned book” I could think of on the top of my head was Maus by Art Spielgman (read this blog to see my review on it)! What other banned books are there?
Knowing I couldn’t answer this question, I searched up some banned books and WOW.
Some banned books seemed to have kinda STUPID reasons to get banned. Here are the ones that stuck out to me the most.
3. Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig
At first, seeing this book is quite whimsical. A donkey finds a pebble that can grant the holder’s wishes, but the donkey learns a classic lesson: be careful what you wish for. But then looking into the book deeper…
Oh my gosh! This is written by the same guy that wrote the book that inspired Shrek!
…I’m just kidding, of course. But, this book was banned for one reason: it portrayed the police as pigs.
That may be reasonable, at first, since “pig” was an offensive slang term used to describe the police. But if you are an animal geek like me, you can see plenty wrong with this term.
First, the term of “sweating like a pig” is totally wrong. Pigs don’t have sweat glands, so “sweating like a pig” means you aren’t sweating at all!
Second, despite pop culture showing pigs as lazy animals, these swine have been shown to be very intelligent! Pigs can recognize themselves in a mirror and use them to solve problems! They can find their way out of a maze! Heck, a study has shown that pigs can effectively play shooter games by moving the joystick with their snout! Scientifically, being called a pug is more of a complement now!
Well, this is the end of part one, but overall, Sylvester and the Magic Pebble got banned for a bit of a subjective reason and pigs deserve less bad stereotyping.
Seeya next time!
– Nova