Well, this article has gotten some traction. Unfortunately, that means that there are now a handful of bad, ignorant, and quite rotten arguments here in the comments that I think need to be addressed, especially now that this article got mentioned in Medium’s “What We’re Reading” post and (more importantly) has started getting traffic from a website that describes itself as "a forum for the right-wing."
1) “Kids are smarter than you think and propaganda in children’s literature has no effect”
First, I thought that it would be self-evident that it did have some effect. Here’s some reading for you to do (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/desc.12580 and https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8146176/ and https://spec.lib.miamioh.edu/longform/readyones/). There's a reason why powerful organizations, from the Nazis to the MAGA movement, put propaganda in children's books so eagerly: It works.
Second, let’s imagine that the effect is unclear or even that there’s science that shows propaganda has no effect on kids. Knowing what you now know about these books, is that a reason to risk it, or to reward the author by reading his books and paying into his estate? Does propaganda of any sort, from Narnia to His Dark Materials to the swill put out by Brave Books, have a place in front of kids? Is there not a line being crossed?
2) “oH yOuR tRYIng tO bANN bOokS!”
Nice scarecrow fallacy. Read the damned article and stop putting the words that you want to see in my mouth. Nowhere do I say “ban.”
The right-wing bans books. They find ideas in books that they don’t like, such as “inclusion” and “anti-discrimination” and then, if they have the power to do it, they legally forbid access to those books wherever they can.
The left-wing, like me, finds ideas in books that they don’t like, such as “Islamophobia” and “discrimination,” points it out in books, and say, “Hey, here’s some, let’s avoid that one” or, at the very least, “Hey, there are some concepts in here that have aged like milk, parents be aware of it in case your kid starts reading this.”
There’s a difference, and you’re deliberately ignoring it.
3) “It’s okay, Lewis was writing for a different time”
Yes, but the times have changed so he matters less now and we should stop reading him because it’s not okay. The literal point of the article.
4) “These books teach kids to think for themselves”
Honest question: Do you know what propaganda means? It means overwhelming the ability to think for yourself. And the best time to do that is before kids have become good at thinking for themselves.
Unless you're saying kids should read Narnia so teachers can point out how Lewis is trying to influence them in a critical thinking class? That would be a good idea, but from the context of the argument, that’s not what you’re trying to say.
5) “Islamophobia is good - they deserve it”
You’re trash.
Any further comments in these veins may get deleted, and I may even start blocking some people. I'm not willing to be used as a platform for offensive or ignorant ideas or see my words get so manipulated by others for whatever political goal they have. I'm disappointed that my policy of not wading into the comments has allowed some real swill to fester, but I also don't like the idea of removing their comments. Instead, I'm treating it as a public service: In these comments you can find some people saying some dumb, hateful shit. They've outed themselves and you can block or mute them as you wish.
