
Why we shouldn't protect teenagers from controversial issues in fiction - AJRF
http://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2016/may/10/teenagers-controversial-issues-fiction-chris-vick
======
xabotage
>Show complexity – whilst showing the impacts – and yes, appeal – of
activities that may be dangerous or illegal, don’t celebrate the activity. But
don’t condemn the characters either. No-one likes a wagging finger.

I appreciate this "rule" that the author holds. I think there really are two
sides to these kinds of controversial issues - parents who don't fully
understand the appeal, and teens who don't fully understand the danger - and
the best way to show both sides is to tell it like it is.

Unfortunately, since in fiction the author has full reign over the plot,
lazier (or else ignorant) authors who may not fully understand both sides
might simply reward or punish characters regardless of any realistic criteria.
If I tried to write such a book, I would fall into the "ignorant" category,
biased not only by my limited experience but also by my natural desire to
reward characters more like myself, regardless of whether their actions merit
it.

~~~
Vaskivo
I disagree. I believe art should be whatever it wants to be. If someone wants
to write a book glorifying "bad things", I say go for it. It might even be an
interesting read.

Exploring the two sides of an issue (or three or four) should be done "away"
from the book. We should confront those ideas with the real world and
everything else we know. The author has no obligation to present those ideas
fairly or truthfully. [1]

Parents should tech their kids to think critically, to accept that anything
can be wrong or misleading. They should always evaluate what they learned and
gather their own conclusions.

[1] And writing about X doesn't mean the author subscribes to X.

~~~
themartorana
All the way agree. Parents should discuss a book after it's been read (yup, it
means reading what your kids are reading, and teenagers don't always have
great taste...) and go over anything controversial, leave the floor open for
questions, encourage them to consider scenarios that are outside of their
experiences, and so on.

Teenagers are perfectly capable of handling adult topics if they have the
support of adults to help them grasp the entirety of it all. Keeping them
insulated in a bubble, away from the real world, just means they'll get to
experience it all at once, alone, without support, when they finally venture
out of the house as young adults.

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raverbashing
Oh, really, we shouldn't?

And we usually haven't, but there have always been voices against, either the
"save the children" crowd or something else.

(and yes, today SJWs are part of the problem)

~~~
moron4hire
If you would like people to be sympathetic to your cause, you should probably
learn to stop using language life "SJW" that is designed to turn them off
completely.

~~~
Karunamon
I don't think anyone that uses that term intends to take anything other than a
scorched earth position with the people it describes.

..and for good reason. The mindset is arational and immune to basic logic and
discourse. It's like trying to convince a deeply religious person that their
God doesn't exist - it doesn't work that way.

~~~
dizzy3gg
So we should insult deeply religious people by calling them derogatory names
also?

EDIT: Asking if you think its fair to call somebody names because they don;t
have the same beliefs?

~~~
adrusi
"SJW" is roughly analogous to "bible thumper" and about as derogatory too.

~~~
dizzy3gg
My point exactly, it's an insult that people seem to think is fine cause they
don't have the same beliefs. If only we were all the same.

~~~
Karunamon
Only if you treat all beliefs as equally valid _a priori_.

Some beliefs are demonstrably harmful.

~~~
germinalphrase
Can you give a little more depth to the position that social justice is
'demonstratably harmful'?

Edit: I ask because as a teacher who's married to a social worker I'm pretty
sure we both get up every day and try to improve the lives of people in our
community.

~~~
Karunamon
Not the _concept_ of social justice (which generally includes positive things
like like equality of opportunity), but the label _social justice warrior_.
Those are two different things.

Here's my litmus test:

* Do you parrot discredited statistics like the wage gap? (Bad information is self evidently harmful)

* Do you instantly cut off communication with people who do so much as disagree with you? (Fosters an echo chamber, see bad information above)

* Do you publicly label people who disagree with you as words ending in _-ist_? (Such labels are of questionable value anyways, less so when they don't even apply, and that's before talking about the social consequences)

* Do you try to get people who disagree with you fired? (Nuff said)

* Do you rally your friends to pressure media companies to change/stop making things that offend you? (Harmful to free expression, artistic integrity, and probably the economy)

* Do you use hateful language against people, and then rationalize it as okay because those people are above you in some social hierarchy?

Then you are not a "social justice warrior" or "SJW" and the "harmful" label
does not apply.

~~~
ZeroGravitas
You might need to add something about the goals, otherwise you very neatly
describe people in Gamergate, who ironically enough, apparently popularized
the term.

Maybe we can call those that use such tactics for social justice aims, Social
Justice Gators, to clarify things while annoying people in various camps?

~~~
Karunamon
Well, I don't really share your views there (and I am _quite_ curious how you
arrived at that conclusion), but HN probably isn't the best place to hash that
out. Would you be willing to continue this offsite?

------
rabboRubble
In high school I was /enraged/ to learn that the books given to me were
censored. Books like Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet.

I learned that when it came to respecting the power of speech, the Emperor had
no clothes, and when deemed expedient a public institution would toss out
their principles.

------
awinter-py
teenagers contribute nothing to the GDP. we could ignore them completely and
they'd still turn into reasonable adults at the same rate. How about making
school curricula marginally more specialized and employing the smartest 5% in
challenging internships? short of that I can't imagine anything moving the
needle on teens.

Anybody who thinks aggressive movie ratings makes a difference to young people
in 2016 shouldn't be considered safe to drive a car.

~~~
Retric
Many teenagers do work, others can be a massive drain on the economy. Wait, no
everyone in the US is just like you never mind.

~~~
awinter-py
[http://taxfoundation.org/blog/which-age-groups-bear-
largest-...](http://taxfoundation.org/blog/which-age-groups-bear-largest-
share-tax-burden)

2% of tax returns are filed by teens accounting for 0% of IRS revenue.

