Parents: Do you really want your children coming home from school excited to tell you about a new book they read that involves the slaughtering of a whole family? In Cold Blood is a book that gives perspective to the horrific realities of american crime. After the Clutter murder took place in 1959, Capote journeyed to holcomb, Kansas where he journaled the feelings and thoughts of those in the town when the crime took place. His gathered information altogether amounted to the creation of the nonfiction novel. Today however, the battle continues between which side is more important: the protection of child innocence or the exploration of new information. In today’s society for children, exposing inappropriate subject matters at a much younger …show more content…
In today’s world kindness and hope should be prevalent. Not violence. Books that students reads should be like the non human forms of role models for students. Books have the power to teach us things we never knew and they have the ability to expand our horizons in many ways. Consequently, books such as In Cold Blood should not hold a place in school shelves because of its intense imagery that for children can be quite terrifying. As a first hand account of this, author Steve Earle of BBC News writes in his article “The Book That Changed Me” about his personal experience of the gut wrenching book. Earle describes that “my ghoulish nine-year-old-self had been awakened by a chilling revelation” (Earle). Earle reads In Cold Blood as an innocent child and it turned his mind to a whole new perspective that nine year olds should not have to go through. Not only are these books exposing students to inappropriate subject matters, but subject matters that children of young ages don’t understand and their minds have not matured enough to understand. In the book George by Alex Gino, Gino comments that “Sexuality was not appropriate at elementary levels” (Hauser), to highlight that students read material at school that may contradict the beliefs they are taught at home. Most children don’t understand the capacity of the topic at which they are reading, which essentially makes the meaning of the book
Literature, the dictionary defines it being the art of written works that is simultaneously designed to entertain, educate and instruct its audience; writers, using their skill of telling stories, use literature in an attempt to transfer their ideas from paper to the reader; for some, this task means bringing their story to a different place and time that is entirely separate from what the could be perceive as ordinary, on order to serve the writer’s intent. With this, the impossible, becomes the probable, and the worst fear imagined becomes the breathed reality; with no separation between the truth, and fiction. The word “literature” in itself cannot be accurately defined, and by attempting to do so, it limits the word not only in its
The children in the society of Fahrenheit 451 are being corrupt due to the violence in entertainment. One night, Mildred invites her friends over to watch television, Montag decides to watch some. When he is, he notices that “...three White Cartoon Clowns chopped off each other’s limbs to the accompaniment of immense incoming tides of laughter”(90). The White Cartoon Clowns are a form of violent entertainment that is targeted towards children. If this is the only type of entertainment that children are exposed to, they could be possibly corrupt into thinking that violence is acceptable and fun. Currently, there are violent movies and video games that are being targeted to teen audiences. Adding violence to entertainment is a way to make entertainment more enjoyable yet it puts society at risk by having the potential of youth thinking that violence is acceptable and fun. Violent entertainment is present in both the book and real life, yet it is
Written by Truman Capote, In Cold Blood is a riveting narrative that documents a historical American crime. Written seven years following the murder of the Clutter Family, Capote was able to produce such a unique novel that reflects the countless hours that he had spent obtaining information. The extensive amount of interviews and reports add a great amount of depth to the storytelling. The abundance of vivid perspectives captivates the audience and leads them to delve into the inner workings of the character’s actions and thought processes. Resulting in the unveiling of psychological conflicts that raise the question of morality. Capote believes that it is
Many people have problems with the violent programs on TV, and they don’t want them to be played on TV because of their kids. They get scared when inappropriate shows are on TV. In the essay “Now You Take “Bambi” or “Snow White” — That’s Scary” author of horror novels, Stephen King argues against a ban on airing violent television programs to prevent children from being frightened. He begins his essay with an imaginative rendering of the plot of “Hansel and Gretel,” and points out the fact that children are exposed to scary stories in fairy tales. He explains that he has written both series that are and are not appropriate for young children. He has screened the movie versions of his stories and decided which stories are off limits for his children and insists other parents do the same. As support for his argument, King refers to the repeated suggestion that various forms of entertainment, even scary forms, are cathartic, and they offer a way for people, including children, to enter a scary yet controllable world for a limited time, where they can express and release their fears and aggressions. Therefore, King believes that children have the right to experience scary TV programs and movies, but a mature adult should decide what children can and cannot watch. He
In the non-fiction novel, In Cold Blood, Truman Capote follows the tail of the Clutter family murder in Holcomb Kansas. Four members of the Clutter family are brutally murdered by two ex-cons and the story follows the hunt for the murderers, their capture, and eventually some country justice. The murder took place on the night of November 15, 1959. The investigators had no motive for the crime and the only clues that they had were two pairs of boot prints left by the killers. Capote took all of his notes and after the murder had been solved he began to formulate a new kind of non-fiction novel, a feat that no one had truly succeeded at before. Many challenges faced him due to not being able to change facts like a fiction writer might be
In doing so, parents feel as if they are guarding their children of knowledge that their children may not be capable of handling. Originally, dystopian novels such as The Giver were solely written for adults. Many parents feel that Lois Lowry’s The Giver attracts attention to taboo issues such as sex, drugs and infanticide. Ironically, children will inevitably learn about these topics through exposure, regardless of how hard parents try to shelter them from reality. Lois Lowry sheds a light on these topics in hopes of eliciting conversation among children. It is ridiculous to censor The Giver; it handles these topics in an engaging and appropriate manner designed to make readers think. It is important to allow children to acknowledge and understand these topics in a healthy and safe manner, rather than through potentially dangerous
Restricting books is restricting education. Books become banned for many reasons sex, drugs, profanity etc. In the book In Cold Blood the violence and profanity could be seen as banne worthy to some viewers. In Cold Blood gives its student readers a sense of freedom through its murderous plot line while also highlighting how the adult’s fear the book would beobstructing their pure children.
A growing problem in schools around the country is the topic of censoring books from children based on parents and teachers’ beliefs on what’s appropriate for students. There’s no doubt in my mind that The Glass Castle is filled with adult themes not primarily written for a younger audience. The Glass Castle is a memoir written by Jeannette Walls’ life, largely her childhood with her parents and siblings, and her breaking away from her parents to become a relatively successful adult. The novel contains events of sexual assault and substance abuse, Jeannette’s parents raise her and her siblings horribly and there’s plenty of violence scattered throughout the book- Jeannette tries to shoot another child from her school at one point. However, this doesn’t mean this book should be banned from schools. This book should be allowed to be read by at least high school students not only because of how well-written and a good read it is, but the various lessons about life it offers to the reader, largely through Jeannette’s father.
Often, violence can be viewed as a harsh method to get a point across. Preserving American values by protecting children from violence when the government perpetuates some of the worst atrocities. While banning the book is supported by American exceptionalism, the American society is a democracy that values not using cruel and unusual punishment or corporal punishment. Although, it is understandable for people to banned books containing violence to preserve children's innocence, American values or Christian values, it is crucial for people to understand about the evil and intolerance from books. Banning the messenger does not end the evil action or unkindness, but worsen the the situation. "Silence is violence when, as in this instance, it
According to the American Library Association (ALA), young adult novels are challenged with the best intentions. In most cases a parent will read a book that their child might be reading in class to find out if the book is hazardous to their child’s well-being. If the novel seems problematic, the parent then challenges the book. Even though the purpose of challenging a novel is to keep children from reading about issues that may not be seen as appropriate for their age group, censoring children from difficult subject matter is not always the solution. There is always controversy when difficult issues arise in adolescent geared novels. Even though there are many concerns with Lois Lowry’s The Giver,
The Catcher in the Rye. The Scarlet Letter. Huckleberry Finn. Harry Potter. The Diary of Anne Frank. Animal Farm. To Kill a Mockingbird. The Da Vinci Code. The Grapes of Wrath. These literary classics have been vital to the education of many, especially children and adolescents (Banned Books). These great novels both teach important values and educate children about world affairs and classic themes. Unfortunately, each of these novels has been banned at one point in time. In a country where freedom is so adamantly advocated, it is a wonder that an issue like censorship would even come up, that such a controversy would sink its claws into the minds of states’ boards of education across the nation.
Violence in mass media has been constantly discussed in the past twenty years as a reasoning for teenage violence against others, between video games such as “Doom” and “Call of Duty”, movies such as “Fight Club”, “Scream”, “American Psycho”, and “Natural Born Killers” and social media dehumanizing acts of violence. Many parents have labeled anything that is not family-friendly as a root cause of criminal behavior. Others also blame the amount of violence in media now as unhealthy to young people, solely because many don’t know the line of what is real and not real. “In Cold Blood”, by Truman Capote, details the gruesome murder of the Clutter family in rural Holcolb, Kansas in November of 1959 committed by two men; Dick Hickock and Perry Smith. In Capote’s novel, he describes the motives of the killers and their backstory in order to help humanize them. Some may say that because of both the violence and the humanization of the killers, the book should be banned. However, banning the book would be censoring something important for youth to learn from. This novel should be implemented in schools to let younger generations be aware of the real world, and to be aware that not everything is picture-perfect in the world.
From infancy onward, parents and teachers have drilled into the young generation that violence should be avoided at all costs. They have preached cooperation, tolerance, and “using one’s words” as tactics to combat difficult situations. Although those lessons are valid, Gerald Jones claims there is an alternative way. In his essay, “Violent Media is Good for Kids,” Jones argues that “creative violence- bonking cartoons, bloody videogames, toy guns-gives children a tool to master their rage” (Jones). In other words, media violence, used correctly, can serve as an alternative method for powering through adolescence. By reading and writing violent stories, children are able to express
An argument supporting the censoring of racy topics in books is that some assume a text’s content will influence readers to act out or take part in the dangerous activity or risky choices that they read about. While teens are likely to and should be influenced by their reading, it does not necessarily mean that it will encourage them to make poor choices. Hopefully, the material will instead allow them to think, imagine, and fantasize. For the most part, teens are turning to novels like A Tale Dark and Grimm by Adam Gidwitz for entertainment; while, Ruta Sepetys’s Salt to the Sea emanates information about a horrific, and under-taught WWII event. In an article titled “Violence in Books: Where Do You Draw the Line?” author S.E. Green feels that
Many parents seek to have children’s literature which contains violence removed or banned from all access to young children. They complain that the subject matter of these books is too much for children to handle. The parents do this as they believe it to be a form of protection from the dangerous world we live in. they know all too well that what is expressed in the books is happening in reality.by reading these violent books it evokes a sense of fear or the need to harm oneself or others. Therefore stopping the chance of them reading these books is shielding them from the hurt and pain which it is associated with. Literature and media are the main reasons for violence in the