Like I have said on several occasions, I thank the Lorde Jezus I don’t have kids. One more reason;
A graphic novel about middle-school life has been taken off the shelves at Sioux Falls schools after a parent complained about cartoons containing foul language, sexual references and teen smoking.
Editor Ariel Schrag’s “Stuck in the Middle: Seventeen Comics from an Unpleasant Age†will be available only to teachers for checkout.
Here is the full Gargoyle story. This comment made me laugh;
She said the message a student draws from a cartoon might be a bad one.
Yes, those evil cartoonists and editorial satirists how dare they use humor to drive a point home. But Shrag fights back;
Schrag found that logic puzzling. The positive resolution to a cartoon is how the reader relates the story to his own experiences, she said. “Not all stories have a happy ending.”
Really? I thought everything was sunshine and butterflies in Sioux Falls?
“I think a prose book that would have similar content would go unnoticed,” Schrag said. “It’s a lot easier I think to sort of demonize graphic novels. It kind of comes down to laziness.”
And ignorance.
I dont think it was all about sex, but “foul language, sexual references and teen smoking”.
School Supply Store reviews the COMIC as:
A very unscientific poll recently revealed that 99.9% of all people who attended middle school hated it. Fortunately, some of those people have grown up to be clever and talented comic artists, with an important message to share: Everyone can survive middle school!
Edited by underground comics icon Ariel Schrag, this anthology of illustrated tales about the agonies and triumphs of seventh and eight grade features some of Americas leading graphic novelists, including Daniel Clowes, Joe Matt, Lauren Weinstein, and Ariel herself. With a sense of humor as refreshing as it is bitingly honest, seventeen artists share their stories of first love, bullying, zits, and all the things that make middle school the worst years of our lives.
Funny, classes can purchase it here at a discount:
Class Set Discount
* buy at least 10, save 10%
* buy at least 25, save 15%
http://www.schoolsupplystore.com/Stuck-in-the-Middle-17-Comics-from-an-Unpleasant-Age-P107098.aspx
The crazy part is that Daniel Clowes is the fucking second coming of Robert Crumb.
Rat Finks!!!!!
I can’t wait to be the eye-poker at the PTA meetings.
Graphic novels, comics, ‘zines, should be a way of life for young people. It keeps them sane and gives them a realistic view of life. What can you learn from Sports Illustrated?
I firmly believe “Welcome to the Dollhouse” should be mandatory viewing for middle school kids. Life from their perspective.
The irony is that kids can get their hands on this book anyway, and all the hoopla about it now will probably tempt kids to get in now.
What about the parents of Whittier and Axtell Park students? They weren’t even given a chance to show off their prejudicial biases. Why are Edison and Patrick Henry always given preferential treatment?
Why not let the parents just bowdlerize the damn…er darn book by editing or removing the pages or chapters they find offensive. Everybody wins!
Because most of the kids that go to Whittier have parents that work 3-4 jobs, they don’t have time to read comic books.
And the parents at Axtell probably don’t read english very well.
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