SPECIAL FEATURE: BY KIDS
Natalie, Age 13
Banned books are a mixed bag. One example of this is Little House on the Prairie book. Like a mixed bag, Little House on the Prairie has many good ideals that come with the bad. It could be argued that the book romanticizes being a settler which was bad because settlers took land that did not belong to them. However, Little House on the Prairie helps educate people about what it was like for settler children to live at that time. Little House on the Prairie should not be banned because people should have the opportunity to read it and decide if it’s good or bad for themselves.
The Little House book series starts with the main character, a 4 year old girl named Laura. She immediately started stating that there were no other people around except her family. People were offended because they felt that the girl was dismissing ‘Indians’ being on that land.
Later in the series, it is mentioned that she has never seen a town or seen what’s around the corner of her house. No people, besides her family, were immediately around her. People should not be so offended by something that has already been explained.
Some people would see this series as racist because there are some cases that entertain this notion. For example, in the Little House on the Prairie book, the neighbor Mr. Scott says “the only good Indian is a dead Indian.” This means that Mr. Scott had the same mindset that some of the settlers also had at the time of Laura’s childhood. The book shows life on the prairie while also showing the relationship between the Indigenous people and settlers who agreed and disagreed with them from the eyes of a child. Chalking the whole book up as bad because the neighbor is racist ignores the historical reality and context.
In the 3rd book, the Dad is not racist because he respects the land the Indigenous people own and are on. We should put the situation into historical context with the attitudes of the people at the time. For example, Pa responds to Mr. Scott that “He figured that Indians would be as peaceable as anybody else if they were left alone.” Pa wanting to leave shows the right thing to do in the situation of living on Indigenous land. He has the right attitude towards living on land that is not really his. If you ignore those attitudes, then you’re ignoring the reality of history. We shouldn’t ignore the reality of history because history shows the bad as well as the good.
Nowadays, a lot of people make assumptions about children on the pioneer farms, such as those in the Little House series. People make assumptions because what they read or watch doesn’t often give that information. If a book containing important information is taken off the shelf, then no one would ever know about that part of history. They would only make assumptions on what they remember. All parts of history should be acknowledged, regardless of the bad, because you have to look at everything in the bag, not just the good.
It’s wrong for someone who doesn’t like a book to decide what you can and cannot read. If a book is banned it becomes harder to find and read. A compromise between banning the book and being weary of people’s feelings is to put a disclaimer on the cover saying “Warning: Content may be offensive to some readers.” This would tell readers that are easily offended that this might not be the right book for them, but for readers who are not easily offended, they can read this book. This type of disclaimer can be used for books similar to the Little House series that were banned for a small reason.
