ATLANTA (AP) — The Georgia Board of Education voted Thursday to uphold a local school board's decision to leave Harry Potter books on library shelves despite a mother's objections.
The board members voted without discussion to back the Gwinnett County school board's decision to deny Laura Mallory's request to remove the best-selling books.
Mallory, who has three children in elementary school, has worked for more than a year to ban the books from Gwinnett schools, claiming the popular fiction series is an attempt to indoctrinate children in witchcraft.
"It's mainstreaming witchcraft in a subtle and deceptive manner, in a children-friendly format," said Mallory, who is considering a legal challenge of the board's ruling. "The kind of stuff in these books — murder and greed and violence. Why do they have to read them in school?"
Gwinnett school officials have argued that the books are good tools to encourage children to read and to spark creativity and imagination. Banning all books with references to witchcraft would mean classics like MacBeth and Cinderella would have to go, they said.
J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books have been challenged 115 times since 2000, making them the most challenged texts of the 21st Century, according to the American Library Association.
The challenges most often claim that the series encourages children to question adult authority and promotes witchcraft, said Deborah Caldwell-Stone, the deputy director for the association's Office for Intellectual Freedom.
Wait, I don't get it... the religious-nutball-lady (I'm not bothered remembering her name) said "why should they have to read this?" ... so, wait... Harry Potter's compulsary? To be perfectly frank, it shouldn't be compulsary, and I guess it isn't... but the fact that this religious-wack-job-lady (is that what I called her before? Meh) thinks just because it's sitting in the library, then it's compulsary, really speaks to how insane religious folk think.
"I'm for it so we can put Nuclear power plants up there, and then beam the power back to earth on a laser beam." ~ Whidden
I believed that Georgia should just be nuked into a large glass plate just for existing (don't know why), but now maybe they should just be napalmed a little.
That whole southern section of the country is just frikkin crazy! I know there are websites devoted to how Harry Potter is evil but I never thought people would actually take that seriously
Wonder waht these people are going to complain about when Potter dies in the next book, probably about how wrong iyt is for JK Rowling to upset little kids like that.
snackattack said this in post #7 : That whole southern section of the country is just frikkin crazy! I know there are websites devoted to how Harry Potter is evil but I never thought people would actually take that seriously
Hey now. Just because we have a larger number of that particular type of crazy doesn't mean all of us down South are.
Yes, some people take that seriously, but you don't see anyone (or at least I haven't) who's not a fundamentalist actually listening to them. Except to make them angry by looking for the oppurtune moment in their rant to point out that, by those standards, their beloved Wizard of Oz that's played on TV once a year should also be banned because Glinda's a GOOD witch. But honestly, the Bible Belt ain't as bad as it used to be. At least 'round where I've been. You've got far more people rejecting their family's fundamentalist beliefs than people converting to them. Only way those beliefs can continue to exist in the long term (barring unforeseen circumstances) is for fundamentalists to start making lots of babies so at least two will remain true to the faith. But since they preach that sex is bad...well, they're kinda out of luck. Even my nanny, who was raised as a more fundamentalist type, has come to accept that her beliefs weren't entirely correct and gets more open-minded all the time. So it's not just the crazy young'uns leaving either.
"The kind of stuff in these books — murder and greed and violence. Why do they have to read them in school?"
How to make a fundamentalist Christian really angry: "I agree! Five days a week is far too often to be exposed to this! They should only have to read about that once or twice a week when they pick up their Bible."
"You're disturbing...yet intriguing. Like couscous. I'm gonna call you Couscous from now on."
12-14-2006 05:46 PM
