Independent Reading Response: How does this text make you think about justice in the world?

            Some people may think that there is justice in the world, and many others think the opposite. After reading Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher, I realized justice isn't the same in everyone's eyes. In my opinion, there isn't justice in the world because any person can be seen as the opposite of who they really are. In the book, Hannah sees her victims as awful people. However Hannah find things horribly wrong with her "victims" because she's looking for them. I think that justice is seen differently depending on who's looking at the case.
            Jay Asher, the author of Thirteen Reasons Why, portrays Hannah as a reserved character. One who doesn't open herself up easily. Because of this trait, Hannah seems to be a bystander in her own issues. On one of the seven tapes, Hannah includes a part about Jessica, her old best friend. Hannah talks about how mad she is at Jessica for leaving her, yet (in my opinion) Hannah didn't do anything to try and keep Jessica within her reach. While in Hannah's mind, she (Hannah) may have been innocent. "She lifted one of her hands and slapped a paper on the table" (Asher 64), Jessica stopped being friends with Hannah out of jealousy, Hannah was on "the list" (a basic "body-rating" system, that was created by a classmate) and she wasn't. And Hannah stopped being friends with Jessica, because Jessica had left her. While it may seem like Jessica is to blame, there are many ways to look at it. One could blame Hannah for being on the list, yet she had no control over it. Or you could be neutral and not blame either. Because there are endless ways to look at situations, I don't think there is justice in the world.
            Hannah, the main character in Thirteen Reasons Why doesn't give her thirteen people (on the tapes) a chance. By this, I mean she doesn't look at both sides of the story. Was she actually innocent? Or did she just want to see herself as innocent? On the third tape, Hannah talks about Courtney Crimsen, one of the popular girls at her school. Hannah loved Courtney, they were very close friends. But Hannah slowly began to realize that Courtney was just "grooming [Hannah] to be another tally mark under People Who Think Courtney Is a Really Neat Girl." This is another example of how justice can differ in everyone's eyes. Yes, Courtney didn't really want to be friends with Hannah, but she wasn't necessarily being mean. I can understand how Hannah was offended, things like this have happened to me before. But I do not think Courtney is to blame for this, she only wanted to be liked by everyone. Courtney's act wasn't unjust, it was simply an urge to fit in.
           Although in some cases, there is an obvious wrongdoer. For example, on the second tape, Hannah talks about a boy named Tyler. Tyler watched Hannah through her window, doing things like getting dressed and even sleeping. What Tyler is doing is a real problem, not only is it scary, an invasion of personal privacy, but it is also illegal. The worst part about what Tyler was doing is the pictures. He took pictures of Hannah in her house, he basically stalked her. And Hannah absolutely hated him for this. Hannah almost felt bad for him, "I sincerely hope you burned or erased those pictures. Because if they get out... I'd hate to think what might happen to you." She knew things wouldn't be easy for him if he was exposed. In this case, I one hundred percent see that it wasn't Hannah's fault. It wasn't fair to Hannah because she couldn't do much about the situation.
           Yes, I'm saying that Hannah is purposefully victimizing some of these people. But no, I'm not saying her suicide was pointless. She had so many small issues going on, that we could sense from the tapes, and she couldn't deal with them all at once. All of the issues together are more overwhelming than one at a time.

Argument Essay on Banned Books: Second Draft

Throughout the world, parents are trying to shield their children from real life issues in Young Adult novels. One of these books is, “The Perks of Being A Wallflower,” by Stephen Chbosky, which teaches many important lessons using mature scenarios. Charlie, the main character, is a high school freshman who has to enter the high school world and in his case, it means a lot of drug trials and sex, both issues are deemed as inappropriate issues for intermediate school students to be reading about. School libraries and teachers are trying to remove the book from their libraries. However, this book should not be banned because it teaches readers about controversial issues and themes that they can connect to, like sexual experiences and being influenced by their peers.

Many parents, who are uncomfortable with mature themes in Young Adult novels, are trying to censor the books that their kids are reading. Diana Verm a 10th grader in Conroe, Texas, was assigned Fahrenheit 451 by her English teacher. She began reading it but stopped after a few pages because she felt that there was too much “cussing and then the burning of the bible.” (Religious Nuts in Texas Seek to Ban Book About Book Banning). Diana Verm told this to her father, Alton Verm, and he worked on pushing administrators to ban Fahrenheit 451 from school libraries. Amy Freeman, a mother of three, gave her opinion on Young Adult literature in the article “Darkness Too Visible” by Meghan Cox Gurdon. She went to her local bookstore and found that there was “nothing, not a thing, that I could imagine giving to my daughter. It was all vampires, suicide and self-mutilation, this dark, dark stuff.” (1).The same article also said that these books contained “hideously distorted portrayals of what life is,” but I’d have to disagree. The Perks Of Being A Wallflower contains similar issues to books in the article, but the portrayal is completely realistic, it isn’t an over-exaggerated version of an issue a person might experience in real life.

There is a need for children to learn about the important themes that they are being shielded from, like sex and drugs. The Perks of Being A Wallflower is written about so many valuable themes, and if it were banned, how would children learn about them? Towards the beginning of the book, Charlie flashes back to when his brother threw a huge party while their parents were in Ohio. Charlie was told to stay in his room and he did, but at one point during the night a couple came in asking if they could use his room. Charlie just sat there trying to ignore the fact that the boy was basically raping his “girlfriend”. It was all very innocent seeming, when Charlie’s sister came in his room to check on him, she found the couple on his bed and asked Charlie “Why didn’t you stop them?” Charlie responded with, “I didn’t know what they were doing,” (Chboksy 31). Charlie learned about how rape can happen when you don’t even realize it. If The Perks of Being A Wallflower was banned, then children wouldn’t be able to learn any of the lessons that Charlie learned, including the one in this section of the book.

The idea of censoring books is only going to make children read them more. When books are banned it is going to create a higher profile for that book. In the article “The Banned Books We Have Loved” by Jen Doll, Rita Meade, a librarian, is quoted: “I honestly don’t think that banning a book ruins its reputation or makes children afraid to read it. If anything, the opposite will happen.” (3). I completely agree with Meade, being a student myself, if a book were banned that would only make me want to read it more, to see why it had been banned in the first place. Later in the article, Meade adds that, “a book being added to a censored list simply means she’ll only fight harder to get it into the hands of kids because it means the book has an important message along with being just entertaining.” (3). I think that Rita Meade made a valid point, these books are being banned because people don’t think that the message is being relayed through appropriate scenarios. In my opinion, if it relays an important message, why would you keep your kids from it? An example of this is in The Perks of Being A Wallflower is when Charlie takes LSD, and he doesn’t have the greatest experience. He doesn’t remember much of what happened the night before, but he does make it clear that he will “never take LSD again.” (Chbosky 100). This teaches kids the bad side effects of drugs through a mature scenario, but it does put across the message that drugs are bad.

These banned books have too many valuable lessons to be banned from school libraries. It’s hard to learn about rape or sexual abuse if you haven’t experienced it in your own life, so how else do we learn about it? An extremely graphic movie? Books seem to be the best way to teach us about new and mature topics. Some of the scenarios can be graphic, so maybe kids should discuss the book with their parents before they read it. This way the child will still be able to have a say in what they get to read.

Monday Muses

Recently the new One Direction song, Story of my Life, was released. The morning that it was released I listened to it nearly thirty times. It may seem a bit cliche to say that I was inspired by this sappy boy band song, but the truth is, I was. In my opinion, the song is truly about how these five boys, Louis, Liam, Harry, Niall and Zayn haven't become terrible, disgusting people because of the fame that surrounds them. The "Story of my Life" video recreates images from the boys' childhoods, making everything in the image recreation the same, but the people in the recreation are older versions of themselves. I think the video director was really trying to put across the idea that these boys are still the same people they were when they were younger and still living a normal life. Now, they're just a bit more famous. The video director wants the fans to know that the fame hasn't gone to the boys' heads like it has for some other younger stars. For example, Miley Cyrus, all anyone can talk about these days is her latest scandal, whether it's her newest outfits or a new video. It's the same with Justin Bieber, you can't stop hearing and reading about all these awful things he's doing. While my thoughts may be biased, considering I like One Direction and don't like Justin Bieber or Miley Cyrus, it is still the truth. I'm not saying One Direction won't ever change, but after three years of being world famous, they've done a pretty great job. 

Now back to how the song inspired me, it really made me realize that I shouldn't let the environment that I'm in change me, whether it's new friends or simply a new school. I should stay true to myself and if people actually like me for myself, they'll stick with me. Otherwise, those friends aren't worth the work. While this idea may be a bit of a stretch from the song's message, this is what I got from the song. Others may have understood different things. But the definite overall message is stay true to your roots, and that message can be interpreted in many different ways.

Argument Essay on Banned Books: DRAFT

"The Perks of Being A Wallflower" teaches many important lessons using mature scenarios. School libraries and teachers are trying to remove "The Perks Of Being Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky, from their selection of books, and in my opinion it shouldn't be removed just because of mature and non traditional themes and issues.

Many parents, who are uncomfortable with mature themes in Young Adult novels, are trying to censor the books that their kids are reading. Diana Verm a 10th grader in Conroe, Texas, was assigned “Fahrenheit 451” by her English teacher. She began reading it but stopped after a few pages because she felt that there was too much “cussing and then the burning of the bible.” Diana Verm told this to her father, Alton Verm, and he worked on pushing administrators to ban “Fahrenheit 451” from school libraries. Amy Freeman, a mother of three, gave her opinion on Young Adult literature in the article “Darkness Too Visible” by Meghan Cox Gurdon. She went to her local bookstore and found that there was “nothing, not a thing, that I could imagine giving to my daughter. It was all vampires, suicide and self-mutilation, this dark, dark stuff.” The same article also said that these books contained “hideously distorted portrayals of what life is,” but I’d have to disagree. “The Perks Of Being A Wallflower” contains similar issues to books in the article, but the portrayal is completely realistic, it isn’t an over-exaggerated version of an issue a person might experience in real life.

The idea of censoring books is only going to make children read them more. When books are banned it is going to create a higher profile for that book. In the article “The Banned Books We Have Loved” by Jen Doll, Rita Meade, a librarian, is quoted “I honestly don’t think that banning a book ruins its reputation or makes children afraid to read it. If anything, the opposite will happen.” I completely agree with Meade, being a student myself, if a book were banned that would only make me want to read it more, to see why it had been banned in the first place. Later in the article, Meade adds that “a book being added to a censored list simply means she’ll only fight harder to get it into the hands of kids because it means the book has an important message along with being just entertaining.” I think that Rita Meade made a valid point, these books are being banned because people don’t think that the message is being relayed through appropriate scenarios. In my opinion, if it relays an important message, why would you keep your kids from it? An example of this is in “The Perks of Being A Wallflower” is when Charlie takes LSD, and he doesn’t have the greatest experience. He doesn’t remember much of what happened the night before, but he does make it clear that he will “never take LSD again.” (page 100) This teaches kids the bad side effects of drugs through a mature scenario, but it does put across the message that drugs are bad.

There is a need for children to learn about the important themes that they are being shielded from, like sex and drugs. “The Perks of Being A Wallflower” is written about so many valuable themes, and if it were banned, how would children learn about them? Towards the beginning of the book, Charlie flashes back to when his brother threw a huge party while their parents were in Ohio. Charlie was told to stay in his room and he did, but at one point during the night a couple came in asking if they could use his room. Charlie just sat there trying to ignore the fact that the boy was basically raping his “girlfriend”. It was all very innocent seeming, when Charlie’s sister came in his room to check on him, she found the couple on his bed and asked Charlie “Why didn’t you stop them?” Charlie responded with, “I didn’t know what they were doing,” (page 31). Charlie learned about how rape can happen when you don’t even realize it. If “The Perks of Being A Wallflower” was banned, then children wouldn’t be able to learn any of the lessons that Charlie learned, including the one in this section of the book.

In conclusion, these books have too many valuable lessons to be banned from school libraries. It’s hard to learn about rape or sexual abuse if you haven’t experienced it in your own life, so how else do you learn about it? An extremely graphic movie? Books seem to be the best way to teach children about new and mature topics. Some of the scenarios can be graphic, so maybe kids should check with their parents before they read the book. That way they will still have the option of reading it.