OPINION:
Another day, another cancellation.
Yesterday, it was Mr. Potato Head. Today, it’s Dr. Seuss.
March 2 marks Read Across America Day, a national recognition of Dr. Seuss’ birthday for more than 20 years. Now, a liberal educator group dubbed “Learning for Justice” is demanding Dr. Seuss’ books be stripped from school libraries because of their “racial undertones.”
The Daily Wire reported districts such as Loudoun County Public Schools in Virginia have already told its teachers to “avoid connecting Read Across America Day with Dr. Seuss.”
“Realizing that many schools continue to celebrate ‘Read Across America Day’ in partial recognition of Dr. Seuss’ birthday, it is important for us to be cognizant of research that may challenge our practice in this regard,” Loudoun County Schools said in an announcement as reported by the Daily Wire. “As we become more culturally responsive and racially conscious, all building leaders should know that in recent years there has been research revealing radical undertones in the books written and the illustrations drawn by Dr. Seuss.”
Um, what? Are the Whos down in Whoville too White?
Yes, apparently, they are.
After reading 50 of Dr. Seuss’ books, many of which were written in the 1950s, Learning for Justice found of the 2,240 identified human characters, there were only 45 of color and 43 of those “exhibited behaviors and appearances that align with harmful and stereotypical Orientalist tropes.”
Learning for Justice found Dr. Seuss’ books are plagued with “orientalism, anti-Blackness, and White supremacy.” Additionally, too many of the non-White characters are male.
Book banning in our public schools has become all too common — and terrifying.
Last year, Burbank Unified School District in California banned five classic novels from being taught in their curriculum: Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Mark Twain’s “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” John Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men,” Theodore Taylor’s “The Cay” and Mildred D. Taylor’s Newbery Medal-winning young-adult classic “Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.”
The calls to ban were similar to that of Dr. Seuss — they caused potential harm to the public school’s Black children because of their racial undertones. All but “Huckleberry Finn” was required reading.
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