Most Banned Books at Schools
Many schools and college societies have banned many books, even great works of literature have been banned.
Most school districts permit the banning of books for use in the classroom on grounds of sexual inappropriateness, but the policies usually fail to specify what constitutes inappropriateness. Instead, school board members and administrators tend to base their judgments on their personal conceptions of sex related content unsuitable for students. However, some districts do offer guidelines in a slightly more specific form. 
For instance, the Bay County School Board (Florida) has assigned books to one of three categories: (1) works that contain no vulgarity or explicit sex and are thus suitable for classroom use, (2) works that contain a “sprinkling” of vulgarity and thus are likely inappropriate, and (3) books that include the curse word “goddamn” and “a lot of vulgarity” so they definitely should be excluded from classrooms (although they might be allowed in school libraries). Among the works placed in the school board’s category 3 are Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night and The Merchant of Venice along with such novels as Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, Thomas Hagen’s Mister Roberts, Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, and Stephen Crane’s Red Badge of Courage (Suit challenges, 1987).
To reduce confusion among teachers, administrators, students, and parents regarding what sorts of books are to be banned, schools can usefully produce a written policy describing their standards (and the reasons for such standards) in judging books’ suitability for classrooms and libraries.
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I don’t think schools should censor literature, it breeds ignorance in our youth.
I don’t think this is meant to censor, per se, because in many cases the books are still available in the school library. It seems more like teachers do not feel confortable with having classroom discussions about books that are sexually explicit and/or contain a lot of profanity. Can’t say I blame them there – with the way our society is today, that’s just a lawsuit waiting to happen.
Very interesting!
Well-written article. I did not censor my own children’s literature; but they had “mom” on hand to discuss the contents. When you are dealing with other people’s children, you are in fresh territory.
It’s a hardone, and it’s a mystery why classics would be banned. there are some books I wouldn’t want children to read but I wanted my children to read all the classics.
Interesting! I never thought there were books that were banned..
Nice article. Your articles are always very informative.
Keep it up.
Very good. You really write so well. Too bad this Web site gets so many advertisments, flash elements and such. I had to go on a stronger computer to prevent all of them downloading.
Banning. A great topic. My wish is that liberal democratic traditions prevail in future taking more books from that list of criteria that you write of.
What is banned to one is lavished to another . Thank-you . j