We Censor What Our Daughter Reads
When talking about children and reading, I often come across people who make a specific point of mentioning the either their parents did not censor their books when reading, or that they do not censor what their children read. This often comes in a statement like “I was allowed to check out any book in the library, in the kid or adult section”. Personally, I think this is great, but often it is said in such a way as to imply that any parent who censors their child’s reading is one of those people who thinks the Harry Potter books are Satanic.
I do not think the Harry Potter books are Satanic, but I do censor what my daughter reads. Believe it or not, I wish I did not have to censor any of her media. But this is a child who, if she sees a preview for a new horror movie, suddenly cannot walk down the hall by herself. We had a school year where she had to read two books in a row that dealt with child death, and we nearly lost all the progress we had made on getting her to go to sleep on her own. We had nightmares and anxiety and fears that she could die of dysentery. This is not a child who can read Steven King.
Even now, she is not allowed to read (or watch) the Hunger Games, because children killing children is not something her sensitive soul can deal with. We have only watched the first three Harry Potter movies, because there is child death in the 4th one (though I think this year we can probably make it through that one).
I censor her books the same way I censor her movies. I do not mind some sex/sexuality, but we avoid violence. I do not know that I will ever want her watching The Walking Dead. In the same way, I do not want her reading books in sexual violence is part of the story. In fact, C and I, in our moving purge, threw out some books that had scenes we decided were not appropriate for her. (For the record, these were often also poorly written books.)
To go along with this, we are choosing not to expose her to the Twilight books or movies. This is actually because we believe they have an unhealthy attitude toward sex, as in, sex equals death, and also that first love is all encompassing forever love. Pop Tart can already be obsessive in her relationships. (She got in trouble at school last week because she got mad that her best friend was hanging out with someone else.) Some of this may be normal 12 year old girl intensity, but at the same time, C and I both know the power of internalized messages at this age. The message of Twilight is NOT something we want her to internalize.
On some level, this censorship is easy for us. Pop Tart is not a big reader. She does not actively search out new books. She reads because she has to for school. I buy her graphic novels, and she enjoys those more than regular books. But it does mean that we have pretty tight control over what books she is even aware of.
Honestly, I would like it if she fought us on this someday; if there was a book she wanted badly enough to read that she would push for it, despite what we might say. That would be great. And there is a good chance we would relent, but probably not if it was by Dean Koontz or EL James.
