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Harry Potter banned at local Catholic school

post #1 of 42
10/27/07 at 5:53am
Thread Starter 
http://www.boston.com/news/local/art...y_bans_potter/

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,305061,00.html

http://www.thebostonchannel.com/asse...31/detail.html

This is a bit much.
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post #2 of 42
10/27/07 at 6:11am
What a load of rubbish
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post #3 of 42
10/27/07 at 6:14am
I don't think there's anything wrong with a parochial school not wanting the Harry Potter books in its library. The use of whizardry is against the teachings of the Bible. If the parents want their children reading those books they can read them at home and if they don't approve of the school's decision they can remove their children from that private school and put them in another. J.K. Rowling is enjoying the fruits of the publicity. The more controversy that's stirred up, the more sales she makes.
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post #4 of 42
10/27/07 at 6:16am
Harry Potter has been one of the most banned books in the past few years. It pops up every now and then, and it gets a ton of coverage.

I've often found that the Potter books were "gateway" reading. Many of the kids that picked up the first one ten years ago are now reading things like The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, and other complex epics. To ban Potter on the 6th grade level may stop some kids from learning to love reading. This is so sad.
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post #5 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:34am
I wish the Catholic Church would update itself and stop contradicting itself.

My reason being:

They ban things like wizardry and witchcraft. The use of spells, disapperating, etc are all considered a sin, possibly even demonic. However looking at the story of Jesus, did his body not "disapperate" from this Earth? Do we not "chant" blessing prayers at Sunday mass? Does not the bread and wine (or grapejuice) "magically" change to the body and blood of Christ?

The use of "magic" is in the Catholic Church. They run so closely parallel with witchcraft the only thing that stops them from being another form of witchcraft is the that the bible says that witchcraft is evil.

If its so evil, then why is Christ's birth lined up with the Winter Solstace or that his death became associated with the Spring Solstace, both pagen holidays? If they shunned any pagen or witchcraft, then their holidays would not align with pagen holidays.
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post #6 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:40am
Acts of "magic" performed by God and acts of magic performed by men are two different things. I'm not going to bother commenting about pagan holidays coinciding with Christ's birth and death.
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post #7 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:41am
hey its got witchcraft and gay people in it. What did she expect after her statments.
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by the way i am kidding, i dont see anything wrong with kids reading those books
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post #8 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:43am
Quote:
Originally Posted by lunasmom View Post

If its so evil, then why is Christ's birth lined up with the Winter Solstace or that his death became associated with the Spring Solstace, both pagen holidays? If they shunned any pagen or witchcraft, then their holidays would not align with pagen holidays.

Those where planned by the church at the time, to help people to adjust to christen faith..
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post #9 of 42
10/27/07 at 8:09am
Quote:
Originally Posted by theimp98 View Post
Those where planned by the church at the time, to help people to adjust to christen faith..
I know that. I'm just merely pointing out that if the church really wanted to abolish witchcraft/paganism, then they would have chosen different times.
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post #10 of 42
10/27/07 at 8:46am
Here are some interesting statistics regarding Harry Potter (quote taken from Wikipedia):

Quote:
Since the publishing of Philosopher's Stone a number of societal trends have been attributed to the series.

The most notable trend attributed to Harry Potter has been an increase in literacy among the young. Anecdotal evidence suggesting such an increase was seemingly confirmed in 2006 when the Kids and Family Reading Report (in conjunction with Scholastic) released a survey finding that 51% of Harry Potter readers ages 5–17 said that while they did not read books for fun before they started reading Harry Potter, they now did. The study further reported that according to 65% of children and 76% of parents, they or their children's performance in school improved since they started reading the series. Charlie Griffiths, director of the National Literacy Association, said "Anyone who can persuade children to read should be treasured and what [Rowling has] given us in Harry Potter is little short of miraculous." British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, a long time fan, said, "I think JK Rowling has done more for literacy around the world than any single human being."

Indeed as the series progresses, each book gets progressively longer, developing along with the reader's literary abilities. A word-count comparison shows how each book, save the sixth, is longer than its predecessor, requiring greater concentration and longer attention spans to complete. This fact in itself can be seen as contributory to improved literary abilities in children who tackle the series.

In 2005, doctors at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford reported that their research of the weekends of Saturday 21 June 2003 and Saturday 16 July 2005 (the release dates of the Order of the Phoenix and the Half-Blood Prince, respectively) found that only 36 children needed emergency medical assistance for injuries sustained in accidents, as opposed to other weekends' average of 67.
I don't agree with any banning of any book - but a series that has had such a positive impact on society should not ever be taken from the shelves of children's libraries.
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post #11 of 42
10/27/07 at 9:11am
Quote:
Originally Posted by theimp98 View Post
Those where planned by the church at the time, to help people to adjust to christen faith..
Right, if you want to stop your people from going to the big celebration that they're not supposed to celebrate anymore, shouldn't you let them throw a big party that they <b>can</b> celebrate?


Anyhow, its the school's choice to carry what books it wants. If parents want to let their kids read the books, the parents can do so at home, from the public library.

And second of all, its not like Harry Potter is the only great fantasy series for kids of that age. After all, most of us who moved on to big epics like Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit didn't have Harry Potter to start us off. They have the Chronicles of Narnia, Lloyd Alexander's Prydain novels, Anne McCaffrey's stuff, and a ton of other books just like I did. I was reading those long before Harry Potter, and some of the last books might be a little "old" for certain kids anyways (think Death Eaters and dark magic and characters dying for younger kids).
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post #12 of 42
10/27/07 at 9:45am
Quote:
Originally Posted by catcaregiver View Post
I don't think there's anything wrong with a parochial school not wanting the Harry Potter books in its library. The use of whizardry is against the teachings of the Bible. If the parents want their children reading those books they can read them at home and if they don't approve of the school's decision they can remove their children from that private school and put them in another. J.K. Rowling is enjoying the fruits of the publicity. The more controversy that's stirred up, the more sales she makes.

I agree. It is a private school, they can do what they want. If people don't like it, don't go there.
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post #13 of 42
10/27/07 at 11:54am
My MIL (and many of her friends) was very anti-Potter for the same reasons, until she actually watched the first movie and read the first book. I wonder if the school officials have even read the book, or if they are just jumping on the anti-Potter bandwagon. I would expect more from a Catholic school- at least around here they tend to have a greater variety of books than our public schools.
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post #14 of 42
10/27/07 at 12:33pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by esrgirl View Post
My MIL (and many of her friends) was very anti-Potter for the same reasons, until she actually watched the first movie and read the first book. I wonder if the school officials have even read the book, or if they are just jumping on the anti-Potter bandwagon. I would expect more from a Catholic school- at least around here they tend to have a greater variety of books than our public schools.
Same here. My in-laws are very devout Catholics, and kept repeating what they'd read in their Catholic Sunday paper until I gave them a couple of the books. After my m-i-l read them, she couldn't understand what was "wrong" with them. She found the very "moral".

If some schools ban the books, it'll simply make them more attractive to young readers.

I love the HP books, but am also a fan for another reason: As a teacher of English as a foreign language, I'm thrilled that so many of my students don't want to wait for the books to come out in German (the German version of the final book was released at midnight today) that they read them in English. Amazon alone sold 400,000 copies of the "Deathly Hallows" in Germany, and even bookstores in little towns like mine opened at midnight to sell the English version. This weekend, Germany is in a HP craze!
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post #15 of 42
10/27/07 at 3:52pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by catcaregiver View Post
I don't think there's anything wrong with a parochial school not wanting the Harry Potter books in its library. The use of whizardry is against the teachings of the Bible. If the parents want their children reading those books they can read them at home and if they don't approve of the school's decision they can remove their children from that private school and put them in another. J.K. Rowling is enjoying the fruits of the publicity. The more controversy that's stirred up, the more sales she makes.

Ditto that.

I would also like to add that those parent's who are "Catholic" and send their kids to a private "Catholic" school, and are upset about the books being banned really need to rethink their religious beliefs because they are coming across as hypocritical. You can't preach the word of God and support the type of content in these books which range from witch craft to killings to homosexuality (apparently the main wizard is gay).
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post #16 of 42
10/27/07 at 4:23pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Natalie_ca
I would also like to add that those parent's who are "Catholic" and send their kids to a private "Catholic" school, and are upset about the books being banned really need to rethink their religious beliefs because they are coming across as hypocritical. You can't preach the word of God and support the type of content in these books which range from witch craft to killings to homosexuality (apparently the main wizard is gay).
Then how would you explain the works of J.R.R. Tolkien or C.S. Lewis? Both men were devout catholics yet some of their most famous and loved works involve death, war and the use of magic (for good and evil).
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post #17 of 42
10/27/07 at 4:25pm
I don't see anything wrong with the books either, it is a Fairy Tale for goodness sake.
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post #18 of 42
10/27/07 at 4:31pm
That's crazy. It's a book!
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post #19 of 42
10/27/07 at 4:50pm
None of the books say that you have to practice witchcraft, nor tell you that you can. I don't see anything wrong with a fantasy that interests kids.

If the books said it was all real, we can all do it, and we should do it, then I can see their stance.

My own mother fell into that whole thing until I made her watch the first movie, lol. It's not just Catholics...my mother is Southern Baptist.
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post #20 of 42
10/27/07 at 6:07pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by ckblv View Post
I don't see anything wrong with the books either, it is a Fairy Tale for goodness sake.
Exactly. If one looks back through the history of fairy stories one will see that they weren't the cutesy, nursery rhymes that we often see today. Classics like Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella are much different, more adult oriented stories than what was sanitized and put on film by Disney. Snow White is another example. In older versions of the story she wasn't sleeping peacefully waiting to be awakened by a Prince with a peck on the cheek. Her dead body was taken away by a Prince and locked away with him. His mother complains of the dead girl's smell but she is eventually brought back to life (much to the relief of his mother).

I don't really know if what I'm about to link next belongs here but Harry Potter is a fantasy/fairy realm. The essay that is in the link was written in 1938 by J.R.R. Tolkien. The essay, titled 'On Faerie Stories', is an attempt by Tolkien to explain the nature of faerie stories, examine the theories on their origins and to argue that they are not solely the province of children. If you are interested it's a fascinating read (it's long).
On Faerie Stories
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post #21 of 42
10/27/07 at 6:52pm
I sometimes think people just don't have enough substance in their lives so they blather on about nonsense.

Firstly, J.K. Rowlings doesn't have to worry much about publicity. She has more money now than she can spend in one lifetime.

Secondly, what is so different from the magic in Harry Potter than in the Witch in Snow White, or the Fairy Godmother performing magic in Cinderella. For goodness sakes - they are FAIRY TALES!

Thirdly, (I'm Catholic BTW and our daughter went to a Catholic school), the Catholic church has many gay men as priests if we believe all the stories about sexual abuse (and I'm pretty sure the stories are true).

If HP gets our young people off the computers, cell phones, TV and into a bit of old fashioned reading, then it's a wonderful thing.

My personal opinion is that only those ignorant of the good in the books, (the morals, value of true friendships, good over evil), would even presume to bad-mouth them.

And, finally, even if Dumbledore is gay, does that make him bad? Maybe it's time our children learned that there are gay people out there and they aren't monsters. When our daughter asked us about gay people (she was about 10 yrs. old), I simply told her that they were people who were attracted to and loved other people of the same sex and that it wasn't bad, just different than we were.
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post #22 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:00pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Natalie_ca View Post
Ditto that.

I would also like to add that those parent's who are "Catholic" and send their kids to a private "Catholic" school, and are upset about the books being banned really need to rethink their religious beliefs because they are coming across as hypocritical. You can't preach the word of God and support the type of content in these books which range from witch craft to killings to homosexuality (apparently the main wizard is gay).
Normally I would agree, and it may be different in Canada, but you don't have to be "catholic" to go to most "catholic" school here. Often times a parent will chose a private (religious) school over a public school merely for the educational purposes. Often times the number of students versus teacher can inhibit the students at a public school. The ones that are behind often don't get the attention they need and the ones ahead don't receive the challenges that they need.
So parents may opt for a private school to obliviate the number of students per classroom.

Thus if my kid were in this school and I paid the school $50,000 a year to education my child and the only way my child was inspired to read was through harry potter books, then I would definitely raise some eyebrows at that school.

Heads of schools will start to listen when suddenly $50K (or more) per year is taken away from their pockets.
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post #23 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:03pm
That is just ridiculous, I just want to.....to.....


If they are banning that book then they should ban every other fictional book. They are all the same to me.
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post #24 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:08pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by lunasmom View Post
Normally I would agree, and it may be different in Canada, but you don't have to be "catholic" to go to most "catholic" school here. Often times a parent will chose a private (religious) school over a public school merely for the educational purposes. Often times the number of students versus teacher can inhibit the students at a public school. The ones that are behind often don't get the attention they need and the ones ahead don't receive the challenges that they need.
So parents may opt for a private school to obliviate the number of students per classroom.

Thus if my kid were in this school and I paid the school $50,000 a year to education my child and the only way my child was inspired to read was through harry potter books, then I would definitely raise some eyebrows at that school.

Heads of schools will start to listen when suddenly $50K (or more) per year is taken away from their pockets.
Catholic schools in Canada are not considered "private" schools and we do not pay to have our children attend these schools except we are allowed to direct our school taxes to the Catholic school versus the public school. As long as one of the two parents is Catholic, the children are allowed to attend a Catholic school. The Catholic schools are funded by the Government the same as the Public schools. There are private schools and some faith-based schools, but they are not publicly funded. The Dutch Christian Reform have their own schools and they support the schools themselves. My S-I-L is Dutch Reform and they sent their 4 children to their Christian school and yes they had to pay to do that but it is a choice they made.

In our last election (a couple weeks ago), there was a lot of controversy about why the Government supported Catholic schools but not other faith-based schools. It will be interesting to see where that goes.
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post #25 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:23pm
I find it pretty funny that so many people are saying it's just what JK Rowling wants so she can boost sales. Er, she's almost one of the richest women in the world - I don't think she needs to boost sales.

But I've come across this attitude towards her quite a lot in various places. She's a very, very famous author because she wrote a magic series of books that millions upon millions of people loved, and all of a sudden she's got an agenda? Yeah right. That's just nothing more than jealousy on the parts of those who didn't manage to do what she's done.

Good for her, I say. And good for any author who writes anything that makes people want to read more. I have nothing but respect and admiration for JK.
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post #26 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:44pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yosemite View Post
Catholic schools in Canada are not considered "private" schools and we do not pay to have our children attend these schools except we are allowed to direct our school taxes to the Catholic school versus the public school. As long as one of the two parents is Catholic, the children are allowed to attend a Catholic school. The Catholic schools are funded by the Government the same as the Public schools. There are private schools and some faith-based schools, but they are not publicly funded. The Dutch Christian Reform have their own schools and they support the schools themselves. My S-I-L is Dutch Reform and they sent their 4 children to their Christian school and yes they had to pay to do that but it is a choice they made.

In our last election (a couple weeks ago), there was a lot of controversy about why the Government supported Catholic schools but not other faith-based schools. It will be interesting to see where that goes.
Thanks for clarifying that

I don't know how different schools are funded state to state here, but I should have clarified that in Michigan only public schools received public funding. If they were of a religious sect (Catholic, Baptist, Methodist, etc) then while still have to meet state requirements to be licensed to teach much and all of their funds were based on what the parents paid. Private schools were more favored to teach by educators in MI, however you also lost a huge chunk of salary if you taught private rather than public. That's where my point of view comes from. So what you religious preference is was not a factor.
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post #27 of 42
10/27/07 at 7:45pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by KitEKats4Eva! View Post
I find it pretty funny that so many people are saying it's just what JK Rowling wants so she can boost sales. Er, she's almost one of the richest women in the world - I don't think she needs to boost sales.

But I've come across this attitude towards her quite a lot in various places. She's a very, very famous author because she wrote a magic series of books that millions upon millions of people loved, and all of a sudden she's got an agenda? Yeah right. That's just nothing more than jealousy on the parts of those who didn't manage to do what she's done.

Good for her, I say. And good for any author who writes anything that makes people want to read more. I have nothing but respect and admiration for JK.
Well she came from dirt poor so perhaps she thinks one can never have too much money! I am not the least bit jealous of her. I say good for her too! I am a capitalist after all.
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post #28 of 42
10/27/07 at 8:08pm
If you read about her and read about the love she has for Harry and those books, I'm pretty sure she didn't write them to make squillions. She wanted to be an author and nothing else since she was a little child.

She is also one of the most philanthropic rich people around - the amounts she gives to charity and the things she does as a result of her wealth are staggering, and very impressive.
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post #29 of 42
10/27/07 at 8:17pm
I think the best way to make sure a book is in high demand is to ban it. Look at what happened with the DaVinci Code.

My mother's church (not Catholic) also told her Harry Potter was the epitome of evil - she bought into it. Kinda makes me wonder just how far we have come from the Dark Ages.

(As a side note, the priests who abused so many children are pedophiles, not gay. Statistically speaking, boys are less likely to tell about abuse.)
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post #30 of 42
10/27/07 at 11:09pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by ckblv View Post
I agree. It is a private school, they can do what they want. If people don't like it, don't go there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ckblv View Post
I don't see anything wrong with the books either, it is a Fairy Tale for goodness sake.
I agree 100%!
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