Well, if it is of little interest to children then children will not be reading it. I also see very little about a taboo that can be taken in a good sense. If something is too holy or secret for the crowd that means that some self-appointed elite has taken upon itself the arrogant role of hoarding knowledge that the crowd might be able to use and use the word holy as an excuse to keep the crowd ignorant. That is not to say that there are not rational reasons for some of the aversions that taboos dictate, but once the rational reason is established then it is not a taboo anymore. If something can be shared in the right time how do we determine when the right time is? It seems to me that the only way to determine that is that the individual who wants the knowledge shared with him or her seeks out the secret knowledge. If it is freely available then that seeking is facilitated. If the person in question does not seek it out and finds it boring then that is how we can determine that the time is not right. As for morality, I know that it has a technical definition and that according to that definition I have some pretty strong morals myself, but almost every time I hear the word morality or its variations such as moral, morals or moralize being actually used it is being used in a context such that some self-righteous, holier-than-thou types convinced of their own superiority are trying to tell others how to run their lives. That leaves me with a strong distaste for the word morality. As for V. C. Andrews, I have read only one of her books. It was heaven. I did not care for it very much, but I am sure it has appeal to some other people and I for one, would not deny the right of anyone to read that book or any other book just because I don't care for it. I would not deny that right on the basis of age or any other basis. If I did I would be putting myself in the same camp as the self-righteous types who have to disapprove of everyone else because they are not moral enough for them and who take it upon themselves to be the dictators of how other people conduct their own private affairs.
-----Original Message----- From: Ann Parsons <akp@xxxxxxxxxxxx>To: rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx` Cc: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Sat, 4 Oct 2008 4:07 pm Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Re: Adult or Not? Advice, Please Hi all, Roger, you mistake me. I have never thought that sex should be kept away from children. I just think that there are some subjects like rape, incest, extremely graphic violence, child porn, some aspects of homosexuality, and so on that aren't necessarily bad, but they are, as you say, of little interest to children, and should be rationed unless taken with an adult as supervisor. Now, there are kids who because of their life's experience could read adult books and understand them. There are just some things that one experiences as one grows older which are tabu for children. I mean tabu in the actual anthropological sense, something which is forbidden because it is either too holy or too secret for the crowd. I don't mean tabu in the sense of something bad. You used it to connote something bad. I mean it as something which will be shared in the right time. <smiling> This is one of the reasons I dislike V.C. Andrews books. They are billed as being for young adults, but they have subjects which, if not discussed and evaluated, could spawn a host of questions in the mind of children and teens. Again, there are some teens who could read her rot, know it was rot and move on. There are others who wouldn't understand it. There are still others who would find it goulishly fascinating. It is, as I have often said before, amoral. There are books like Huckleberry Finn which have no sex and no violence in them and yet are banned because Twain wrote in the time he lived, and that was how people thought. I don't see anything wrong with Twain. Twain, after all, was a writer whose morals are never in doubt. I can't say that about V.C. Andrews. <smiling> Go figure. Ann P. -- Ann K. Parsons Portal Tutoring EMAIL: akp@xxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.portaltutoring.info Skype: Putertutor "All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost." Email services provided by the System Access Mobile Network. Visit www.serotek.com to learn more about accessibility anywhere. To unsubscribe from this list send a blank Email to bksvol-discuss-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxxput the word 'unsubscribe' by itself in the subject line. To get a list of available commands, put the word 'help' by itself in the subject line.
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