I Know Why A Blogged Bird Sings

Hey, kids!

It's been quite a week, without a Bitch here in St. Louis, but a Bitch is due back any day now...

In honor of a Bitch and Banned Books Week (which ends tomorrow) I'd like to share this info from the fine folks over at the American Library Association. Here's a very small list sampled from some of the most challenged and banned books from 1990-2000.

I'm sure many of y'all have seen this already, but perhaps a few haven't. I just hate to assume we're all on "the same page." Sorry...that was really bad -- I just couldn't help myself.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Harry Potter (Series) by J.K. Rowling
Forever by Judy Blume
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
Goosebumps (Series) by R.L. Stine
A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Newton Peck
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
Sex by Madonna
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
Go Ask Alice by Anonymous
In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
The Witches by Roald Dahl
The New Joy of Gay Sex by Charles Silverstein
Kaffir Boy by Mark Mathabane
Blubber by Judy Blume
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
What’s Happening to my Body? Book for Girls: A Growing-Up Guide for Parents & Daughters by Lynda Madaras
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Beloved by Toni Morrison
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
The Pigman by Paul Zindel
Deenie by Judy Blume
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes

It's very odd and disturbing to see so many books that I know, love and cherish.

And are you really surprised that women and minorities seem to be very well represented -- especially when it comes to someone else telling them to be quiet?

Surprisingly Ann "let's return to McCarthyism" Coulter is no where to be found, but then again, I suspect our friend Ann never quite got the point of Judy Blume's Forever. The Arctic blasts of bullshit that woman utters can best be explained that Ann never read What's Happening to my Body? Book for Girls.

I, for one, was all up in Judy Blume's world when I was a child and teen. Now, I never read What's Happening to my Body? Book for Girls but I was really into What's Happening, the TV show. My love for tell-it-like-it-is black women started young. It's available on DVD, just in case you've forgotten the eloquence of Dee "I don't eat jackass meat" Nelson.

For the life of me, I also cannot understand why anyone would object to Maya Angelou's autobiography. The answer seems obvious -- flatout racist assholism -- but if anyone else knows of any legitimate answer, please fill me in.

Now, I can appreciate why some folks did not enjoy Madonna's Sex book. That bitch acted like she invented the deed itself....but to ban it? C'mon, now....

All we have to do is look at the work of a certain Dr. Kinsey (another banned book favorite) to know that folks will screw around - whether or not they read, see or watch the act. They might not choose to go about it all the ways the Madonna did in her book -- but they'll try to, nonetheless.

It goes with the territory, I suppose. Some folks wanna tell it like it is and some folks just wanna tell it like they want it to be told.

Whether or not those two things are one in the same or mutually exclusive is something to consider...but for another day.

It's the weekend -- and all this talk of sex leaves me wanting to get my Kinsey on! And that, kiddos, is a subject that is better appreciated in person and not with a computer screen or a book, for that matter!

Thanks for reading and being so kind in a Bitch's absence. She'll be back Monday and I'll be just as happy about that as you are!

-- Rob Thurman