The title of an Agatha Christie novel was changed for obvious reasons (rightly in my opinion - which weakens my argument a bit). Should it now be changed to 10 Little Native Americans ?
Fiction is just that, and shouldn't be expected to be factually correct. Particularly not if it's sci-fi, fantasy or "alternate reality" genres, or even just unrealistic / implausible (The Tiger Who Came To Tea, for example).
Where a book includes, for example, a character who is racist or misogynistic, that's perhaps more difficult although it may be a fair representation of commonplace attitudes at the time that it was written. Times change, children can be taught the difference. Parents, teachers etc can have conversations with their children to discuss what they're reading, and the context. I'd be more concerned about current/recent stuff that they might come across on the internet.
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There are many current works of fiction that have racism as their central core, for example Damon Galgut's brilliant Booker winning novel, the Promise. No one in their right mind would suggest tampering with the plot of such books.
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Jane Austen's Mansfield Park contains characters who own plantations in the West Indies and who mistreat slaves. The author clearly doesn't approve of them but acknowledges that such people exist in her scociety. Are such stories to be banned or censored?
Are we to re-cast Shakespeare's merchant of Venice because Shylock was a Jew?
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In the case of the AC book, the racism was casual and not relevant to the plot, so it was right to change it as it would be pointlessly offensive to keep it. @B3 it has been changed - as someone said before, it's now called 'And then there were none'. But when a book is actually about racism, it would be missing the point to change the title, surely? Some stories work well as allegory to highlight an attitude by changing the context (the film 'Don't Look Up', did it well, I think). I'm not in favour of 'no platforming', either - I think we have to confront our demons, not hide from them. But giving offence when there's no principle (other than 'it was always like that') is unnecessary and tone deaf
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“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
But who makes those decisions (ie to change what was written)? Would books that have been banned in the past be banned today? If we back apply our 'norms' to a different society that saw their norms as normal and sanitise what they wrote to our sensibilities, what does that actually do apart from hide a 'truth' - ie that may be they did have those attitudes at that point (whether right or wrong).
And as Hosta rightly pointed out (IMO), if you're going to edit books, then why are so called 'sacred' texts immune? Racism, misogyny, homophobia - all allowable as long as it's religion and written by G_D and not man? Yea, right....
I wouldn't ban books, @steveTu. Much as I wouldn't destroy statues. Putting statues of slavers and in a museum with the context of what they did, not on a plinth in a town square as if they are a heroes, seems like a proportionate way to confront and admit our historic wrongs, rather than to destroy them and somehow pretend it never happened. Books that tell stories which don't fit with our current collective morality don't have to be changed - they will be perceived differently now and if they are distasteful, people won't read them and they'll fade from view. The AC book title was based on a nursery rhyme that no one would repeat now (I hope), so it's not difficult or subtle to say it's inappropriate. All those romance novels about fainting heroines and tall handsome heroes don't need to be banned, they highlight how much more interesting and socially complex the 'source' novels of Jane Austen were, even though she was writing in a time when misogyny was normal.
Combing through school libraries looking for offense to take may seem silly, but we can't hide from the fact - it is a fact - that discrimination is deep rooted in our culture (still) and to acknowledge that by questioning everything rather than just shrugging is a better response.
Have you watched the film 'Misbehaviour'? Get far enough away from an attitude and look back and suddenly you see it for what it was, and it's shocking. These things are still here - that vile 'influencer' who's currently awaiting trial in Europe is a case in point. If some child hears what he says and then reads some 1950s story about casual misogyny, don't you think it might confirm in his mind that those views have some validity? Better to get them out of schools, at least.
And as far as I'm concerned, religious tracts should all be kept in locked rooms and only permitted to scholars who have passed an intelligence test and shown themselves capable of putting them in the context of 'fairy story'. Even Disney has moved on from the idea of handsome princes riding to rescue princesses in towers guarded by dragons.
Gardening on the edge of Exmoor, in Devon
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
And as far as I'm concerned, religious tracts should all be kept in locked rooms and only permitted to scholars who have passed an intelligence test and shown themselves capable of putting them in the context of 'fairy story'.
I have several Bibles in the house. As far as I'm concerned, they should be made available to anyone and everyone. If someone doesn't want them, or any other sacred book, that's their choice. However, for those who choose NOT to agree with what is said, then they do not have the right to dictate who should or should not have them.
I think what I was saying is that stuff being written today that we class as 'normal' because of our societal norms will be seen differently in future. That is how time works. Time changes all - physical and mental - mountains, seas and attitudes change. But then retrofitting today's sensibilities to past events doesn't change those events. They happened - the stuff was done/written/painted/sculpted/filmed. It's like burning books stops the attitude retrospectively - no. If you want to learn and change things then you need to learn from the attitudes and not to white-wash them out. Ism's still exist and will until we all accept that they're wrong - changing past examples of those attitudes does not do that in my opinion.
And who would then decide what is to be edited - Big Brother? Would you want Trump or Johnson editing history (as that is what is suggested) to suit their views? Don't we decry the Russian state for doing that - they decide what their people should know.
What about them (Trump/Johnson) not doing the editing themselves but appointing the people who sit in judgement?
Look back - do you think half the stuff shown on TV now could have been shown in a cinema 70 years ago? Who's rules apply Mary Whitehouse's? Mine? Malcolm Muggeridge's...? Some person's not yet born who will have different sensibilities?
all of us. Society has changed. This debate is part of the process of society shifting from one 'norm' - that of the now older generation - to a different one
Gardening on the edge of Exmoor, in Devon
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
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Are we to re-cast Shakespeare's merchant of Venice because Shylock was a Jew?
But when a book is actually about racism, it would be missing the point to change the title, surely? Some stories work well as allegory to highlight an attitude by changing the context (the film 'Don't Look Up', did it well, I think). I'm not in favour of 'no platforming', either - I think we have to confront our demons, not hide from them. But giving offence when there's no principle (other than 'it was always like that') is unnecessary and tone deaf
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
Combing through school libraries looking for offense to take may seem silly, but we can't hide from the fact - it is a fact - that discrimination is deep rooted in our culture (still) and to acknowledge that by questioning everything rather than just shrugging is a better response.
Have you watched the film 'Misbehaviour'? Get far enough away from an attitude and look back and suddenly you see it for what it was, and it's shocking. These things are still here - that vile 'influencer' who's currently awaiting trial in Europe is a case in point. If some child hears what he says and then reads some 1950s story about casual misogyny, don't you think it might confirm in his mind that those views have some validity? Better to get them out of schools, at least.
And as far as I'm concerned, religious tracts should all be kept in locked rooms and only permitted to scholars who have passed an intelligence test and shown themselves capable of putting them in the context of 'fairy story'. Even Disney has moved on from the idea of handsome princes riding to rescue princesses in towers guarded by dragons.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”