Handmaid's Tale too sexist for school

I wasn't sure what they meant by sexist either - maybe sexist because it portrays men in a bad light?  Or because the handmaids are used as breeders?  I kind of wonder whether the guy complaining has even read the entire book?  Does he know what a dystopian novel is?

I read somewhere that it is also perceived to be anti-islam because the women are veiled and there is a form of polygamy practiced.  Certainly the public executions as entertainment could be taken from the Taliban.  I think the novel is an equal opportunity anti-fundamentalist story and is equallly down on all religions. 

 What's the Mark Twain quote on censored books?  Hopefully this will be good for Atwood's sales.

Edwards' son has been alternately assigned Brave New World...  IIRC, there's lots of drug use, casual sex, etc and so forth in that novel.  Wonder what Daddums thinks of that?

From the article, it sounds like the parents are upset.  Who knows, maybe the kid pointed it out because he didn't like it.  That said, though, given the morality reasoning Edwards gave to explain his opposition to Handmaid's Tale, Brave New World has as much in its content to condemn it as well. 

Ms B brought home a book on child soldiers in Uganda this past week -- she's in grade 6.  The language wasn't "bad" (ie no swearing, not that I care about that) and they indirectly acknowledge the rape aspect when it comes to the female characters without confronting it, but some of the other content was tough stuff (a character in the book must participate in beating to death his schoolmate or have his arm cut off - and the schoolmate is murdered, very intense scene).  Our initial reaction was to question if this was appropriate reading for an 11 yr old and potentially take it away...  But we took a cool-off period and decided to let her lead us.  I had a chat with her about the content and asked if she thought she could handle it, she still wanted to read it and we left her to it.  Lots of discussion over the next few days, but she'll grow more from thinking about issues and trying to understand than she will if we shelter her.  It was a hard decision, though, for a little while. 

It did strike me, though, that the violence was okay but the sexual violence was glossed over.  Oh, well, one step at a time.

Summer wrote:

Certainly the public executions as entertainment could be taken from the Taliban. 

 not just that, but margaret atwood has said in countless interviews how she conceived the framework of the story. all of the laws concerning women, sex, the raising of children born of the "wrong" women, the supremacy of men enshrined into law, etc etc etc in the republic of gilead are all taken from real world examples in history. if it's in the handmaid's tale, it's already happened to women somewhere in the world at some time. it's one of the reasons she doesn't like the term "science fiction" applied to describe it, but rather "speculative fiction". given this fact, it strikes me as particularly stupid to ban this book for sexist content. 

Robert Edwards is a fucking moran.

Shameless Magazine dug up some youtube videos of students presentations of the Handmaid's Tale. I haven't watched them, but will get to them later today. They might be an interesting watch and shed some light on student's interpretations of the book.

http://www.shamelessmag.com/blog/2009/01/atwood-book-considered-more-disturbing-than-war-o/

Thanks, Refuge, I'm glad my approach made sense to someone...  The blond guy thought it was a bit nutty at first and took some convincing and my mother still thinks I should have taken the book away.  Good thing I used to keep my reading to myself -- I remember reading up on Holocaust stories when I wasn't much older than Ms B.

The larger point, though, is that if we do protect our children too much we take away their ability to deal with the world independently.  I think rather than censor material it makes more sense to help provide a filter and context and to teach independent reasoning.  However, that takes more time and effort as a parent, and some people are less inclined to be open about ideas and issues than others.

 In this case, I have a suspicion that Edwards objects to the book existing at all - the language and sexism aspects are really just something he's using to bolster an argument that is truly based on the book introducing ideas that are critical to religion, which he is reading to mean exclusively Christianity, and which other posters have pointed out the book does not limit itself to. 

Timebandit wrote:

The larger point, though, is that if we do protect our children too much we take away their ability to deal with the world independently.  I think rather than censor material it makes more sense to help provide a filter and context and to teach independent reasoning.  However, that takes more time and effort as a parent, and some people are less inclined to be open about ideas and issues than others.

I agree Timebandit but unfortunately most parents that outright ban books, or ways of thinking tend to have children who are illequiped to be able to look at material such as this with the ability to put it in context and reason through the meaning until they are much older.  It might even be detrimental to a child because they wouldn't know how to deal with it.  But I know kids and when they are ready they will go find it even if their parents tell them not to.

Timebandit wrote:

 In this case, I have a suspicion that Edwards objects to the book existing at all - the language and sexism aspects are really just something he's using to bolster an argument that is truly based on the book introducing ideas that are critical to religion, which he is reading to mean exclusively Christianity, and which other posters have pointed out the book does not limit itself to. 

I have a tendancy to agree with you not liking the book in general based on the articles that I read. 

  The point of the book is to be able to look at all the issues he raises and what the causes are and how the student as an individual can make decisions not to perpetuate that.  I wonder how much it has to do with not liking the book and how much it has to do with the fact that people (it sounds like particularily him) don't want to have those discussions because then they have to look at themselves and their own actions and they might not like what they see. Or if his son has those discussions in school he might come home and look at his family and his father and his father is afraid what he will see.

Especially since the struggle to ban the book in general is about power and control, in his case a man saying for a woman ("Let alone a description of situations that must be embarrassing and uncomfortable to any young woman in that class") and a being the voice to say what is and isn't sexism especially since the author herself is a woman.  Maybe he has all the mirrors in his house covered in sheets.