Two case studies

''Posted on the Squeetus Blog July 31, 2006 08:47 PM PST. ''

Whew! That last post sure caused a stir in the comment area, and rightly so. So lovely to hear such passionate opinions (reminder: please watch your spoilers!). In a similar vein, let me present the following:

Case study #1

Situation:  Young boy reads only comic books for the first 16 years of his life. Many (helpful) adults warn him, "Those will rot your brain." Boy is unusually self-confident and stubborn and withstands the criticism, continuing to read the books of his choice.

Result:  Boy graduates high school with 3.8, receives scholarship offers to various colleges, and continues as a life long reader of all kinds of genres. As an adult, he proves himself an upstanding citizen in all regards, and showed enough brains to woo and marry a certain (brilliant) young adult author.

In Conclusion:  Comic books don't actually rot your brain.

Cast study #2

Situation:  Young girl loves to read. Loves it. Reads passionately through elementary school and junior high. High school comes. She learns that the only acceptable kinds of books are "classics" which mean, "books that are usually amazing in some regard but were written at least 100 years ago, end badly, are most likley depressing, have long sentences, and 9 times out of 10 take place in England. No genres allowed, especially anything with humor, pictures, or fantasy."

Result:  Girl isn't as stubborn and self-confident as boy from case study #2. She believes the propaganda, and determined to be a good adult and intellect, she shuns the books of her youth and begins to read only classics. Her reading and verbal score percentages are higher in elementary school than high school. She falls out of love with reading, and even as an English major in college, only picks up books out of duty. She doesn't realize her error in buying into the warped ideology for many years, until she finally cracks, desperate to lose herself in the wonder of a  Story  again, and rebels against the establishment by writing  the goose girl.

In Conclusion:  So, um, why is it again that most high school English classes only read the classics?

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