There are many books that are challenged and banned in your libraries today. But there is one book that stands out to me. This book is called The Absolutely True-diary of A Part Time Indian by: Sherman Alexie. The book The Absolutely True-diary of A Part Time Indian is about an indian boy named Arnold Spirit who start to face new challenges in school and in his community. This book also deals with alot of adult content such as racism, sexual content, and the mentally disabled; therefor i think that middle schoolers shouldn't have access to.


The first reasoning i have tells about a racial comment that that main character made about his dentist.

“our dentist believed that Indians only felt half as much pain as white people so he gave us half the nococain. what a bastard huh?” (p.3)

This qoute portays the sense of humor that the main character has in the begining of the book with a racist joke about indians and white people. He also goes on in the second paragraph to say a curse. But if we let middle schoolers read this book then they are going to think that its ok to be saying racist jokes to there friends or to people they know. It is showing a new curse word to the middle schoolers if the did not know that and would say it out loud because they would think its ok because they read from a book


Another unsatisfactory joke that the main character made is about how he has a stutter and a lisp

“I also had a stutter and a lisp or maybe i should say i had a st-st-st-st- stutter and a lisssssthhhhp”

Though this is a short quote it conveys how the main character has disablility like a lisp and a stutter. While the character is makinga joke about himself, the reader could take the joke the wrong way and could think its ok to make jokes about some disablilitys in their school on the street or even at home and the children could think its ok. There also could be children that when read this book or quote can get very self conscious about there disability or get worse for them.

This next example is very dreadful. It explains how his friend Rowdy has an abusive father andhow it effects his family

“His father is drinking hard and throwinghard punches, so Rowdy and his mother are always walking around with bruised and blood faces”

This is an awful thing to talk about in a book because it talks about child and wife abuse which is very sensitive to kids who have had this kind of abuse before. Parents would also not want there children to read about kids being attacked by there father and later saying in the book that it is “war paint”.

In the book the Absolutely True-diary of A Part Time Indian It also talks about other very sensitive things that middle schoolrs should not know and kids could get very self conscious about topic like these and i belive middle schoolers should not know yet.

Authors note

 

Authors note- Jeremy duarte

There is a crisis going on that we need everyone's help. This issue is called global warming. Global warming is the increase in the earth's average temperature that causes changes in climate and the result could come from the greenhouse effect. While this is causing climate change, it's also causing animals environment to change.

Since the environment is changing, it's hard for animals to adapt to the changes that is happening . This is causing them to go instinct because they are not able to adapt to the changes they are faced with. I care about this topic because there are a lot of animals that are going instinct because of global warming and our environment is also being affected by this. I want readers to know what is happening in the world and how a lot of things they are doing is adding on to global warming and hopefully show them what they are doing to slow down global warming.  

Synthesis page

Jeremy Duarte

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“It is. But if you live in a world that keeps trying to grind you down, you either start thumbing your nose at it or end up very, very short”. This quote is from the story “Am I blue?” by: Bruce Callie. This story is about a boy name Vince and how his problem with his sexuality has affected him and his struggle to find out what his sexuality is and is being helped by his fairy godfather. My position is that I believe that books that have moral values like this story shouldn’t be banned because it helps teach the reader a moral value that sometimes books don’t teach. It also teaches children who are in the same situation how to deal with their problem and overcome it.

“I walk and talk the way I do because I’m not going to let anyone else define me” (10). What this evidence suggest is very important because Vince’s fairy godfather Melvin explains to Vince that he won’t be intimidated by people judging him in anyway. That is very important to show readers how kids shouldn’t care what people say about them for anything they do or their sexuality. “It doesn’t have to be, he replied sharply. If gay people hadn’t been forced to hide so long, if we could just openly identify ourselves , there would be plenty of people you knew that you could ask advice for” (9). This is another significant reason because Melvin explains that if people where more tolerant of gay people, then if people were confused about their sexuality they could as those people who are homosexual.

“I’m trying to teach tolerance and respect for all” This quote was said from a middle school teacher named Sue Protheroe. Sue has been using this story “Am I Blue” to help teach her kids tolerance for gay people. “She said she is not promoting the gay, lesbian or transgender lifestyle but trying to teach respect and tolerance for all people.” I believe what this teacher is great because she is teaching her children to be tolerant of gay people.

“It introduces a very adult and mature subject to an inappropriately young audience. It is likely to introduce sexual confusion to a group of children who are just becoming sexually aware.” While this is true it does introduce a very adult mature subject to a young audience, But I believe that if we are able to teach young kids to be tolerant of gay people then we won’t have problems like Melvin had when he was alive. Many people believe that this has no instructional value, but this story does because it’s teaching children who read this story how to be tolerant of gay people.

This is why I think that books like “Am I Blue” shouldn’t be banned. This story is helping children be more tolerant so they don’t grow up and start to do bad things to people because of their sexuality. This story is also helping children who are in the same position as Vince to help them so they aren’t confused anymore. If we ban books and stories like this then moral values like this won’t be taught and if parents don’t teach children these moral values then who will.

Bibliography       

"Iowa City Press Citizen Local News Section." Iowa City Press Citizen. N.p., n.d. Web

Caille Bruce. Am I Blue.

How society has affected children in my neighborhood

Children and teens in neighborhood are being fueled by something bad. The children and teens are being fueled by rap music, drugs, and being a "Gangster". This is a problem because kids want to be a rapper or want to be a basketball player and the kids think that there is nothing wrong with what they're doing. But the problem with this is that those kids are losing their education. Since these kids want to be a rapper or want to be good at basketball they don't care about their education anymore. They think that education does not play in this so they cut class or cut school. So then while they’re not getting an education they aren’t getting a job to support themselves so they turn into thieves because they need a way to get an income or because they like something. This is caused because children hear rap songs and hear how good it is to be one and how rappers say how much money they get or how much women they get and children think they can reach they if they put all their time into that they can become one too.

Another cause is drugs. This is because kids all they want to do are drugs. They don’t care about anything else. So then they cut school to do the drug’s or They just stop going to school because they don’t believe that going to school is going is help them get the drug. But then they start to run out of money that’s when they turn to crime and start to steal from people so they can fuel this addiction.       

Interview

     1) Q: what is your job?

    A:I work for a japanese airline procuring parts or the aircraft

2. Q:What challenges do u face?

           A: I work with different types of people, some people are cooperative and some aren't. some are nice and some are not. personally some challenges i face is you want your children to do their best and to make smart choices but sometimes they don't.

3. Q:  what have you done or want to do to change the world?

            A: i haven't done anything but i do like the idea of helping children that are in need.

4. Q: What challenges do u think you'll face.

            A: you need funding, you need people that have the same passion  that you have so you can feel the same way and help the children in need   

part 1 of project

 1-“Ray Rice Wins Reinstatement to N.F.L. in Arbitration” by: Ken Belson

In this article “Ray Rice Wins Reinstatement to N.F.L. in Arbitration” by: Ken Belson published on Nytimes.com is about how ray rice (A football player) was reinstated back into the N.F.L by a former federal judge named Barbara S. Jones.  The author explains how when the former heard Ray Rice’s appeal and in those two days he was there he described his version of what happened. When Ms. Jones heard Ray Rice side of the story and saw the video of him attacking his wife and also heard what Mr. Goodell said. Mr. Goodell said “video revealed a starkly different sequence of events from Mr. Rice had described in his initial meeting with the commissioner.” But Ms. Jones ruled that Mr. Rice was “never misrepresented” so he did not deserve to be punished for the second time. Ms. Jones also said that she is not persuaded that Ray Rice would lie to her and that the suspension should be vacated. Because of this, women groups and victims of domestic violence are outraged and want the N.F.L to change attitude toward women in their league.

 I think that this article explains a lot about how small details can change a whole case. For example in this article it talks about how Ray Rice a football player was accused of beating his wife for the second time and how the video tape and Ray Rice explanation was different. This is very surprising because just his explanation was different then what happened in the video and the judge is just using Ray Rice word because she says “I am not persuaded that Rice lied to, or misled, the NFL at his June interview”. It makes me think that maybe the judge is wrong and that, that was Ray Rice then he is getting away with domestic violence.

2-   “Heroin Takes over a House, and Mom” by: Michael Wilson and J. David Goodman

In the article “Heroin Takes over a House, and Mom” by: Michael Wilson and J. David Goodman is about how a woman named Laurie Sperring was affected by heroin and how her surroundings were affected by it. The article first talks about how her surroundings were affected by it. The people of the neighborhood said “People were coming out of the alleys, throwing up,” a third neighbor said. “They were finding needles in there.” The article also talks about how Laurie Sperring was first hooked on to heroin. The article says that when Laurie Sperring and her friend Ashley went to a person named Eric’s home, she met a father named Christian Patterson and his child. She says”Maybe there was something about the way he seemed to have his act more or less together.” And she thought since he had his act together that she tried heroin. And then after a few days, when she went back to Eric’s home, she had an idea. She invited Christian and his child to stay at her home. Then then as the article goes on it talks about how she would throw “drug parties all day and all night” and how they cleaned up the neighborhood.

This is a very terrible thing to hear about because you have a mother who was first addicted to crack then was sent to rehab to be then again addicted to heroin. This is also very sad because of why she did it thinking it could maintain her life and still do the drug because she saw a man who looked like his life was on track because of his appearance when really it could be really bad. It’s also really sad because the drug got even worse where she shot up 10 bundles of heroin each day. This article helps me know how easy someone could get addicted to drugs and how it could turn their life around

3 -Somali Shabab Gunmen Kill 36 Workers in Kenya Quarry By: REUTERS    

 In the article “Somali Shabaab Gunmen Kill 36 Workers in Kenya Quarry” by: Reuters is about how the Somali Shabaab military murdered 36 non-Muslim that were working in a quarry in Kenya. This happened because Al Shabaab militants were punishing Kenyans for past attacks and also sending troops to join African peacekeepers that are battling Islamist in Somalia. This article also explains how people believe that the president hasn’t done anything to secure his country since there was an attack in Nairobi’s Westage shopping mall last year which killed 67 people. Al Shabaab also said that they will not stop unless Kenya pulls their troops out of Somalia.

I believe what is happening in Kenya is a terrible thing. I think this because Al Shabaab is sending troops to Kenya to attack innocent people. This is all because Kenya has troops in Somalia and some troops in the African peacekeepers. Also when the troops of Al Shabaab attack they always separate the people to Muslims and non-Muslims. Then they would kill the non-Muslims. The cause of this Kenya sending troops to the peacekeepers and the effect is Al Shabaab sending their troops to attack Kenya which is sad.      

4- A Long-Sought Fugitive Died Four Years Ago in Syria, Nazi Hunter Says By: Jodi Rudoren

   In the article “A long-sought fugitive died four years ago in Syria, Nazi hunter says” by: Jodi Rudoren is about Alois Brunner. Alois Brunner was the top lieutenant to Adolf Eichmann. This man was also responsible for sending 128,500 Jews to death camps and was one of the “Chief architects of the Holocaust”. After the war Alois Brunner was tried in absentia then was sentenced to death in France. It was said that Alois Brunner died for four years ago because “a reliable source in our eyes had informed the Wiesenthal Center about four years ago that Mr. Brunner had died of natural causes”. But this is not confirmed because of the civil war in Syria. As the article goes on, it explains Alois life. It says “Austria, Mr. Brunner joined the Nazi Party in 1931 and the SS in 1938, and he led the Vienna-based Central Office for Jewish Emigration from 1939 to 1943”. Alois helped to send 47,000 Jew from Austria, 44,000 from Greece, 23,500 from France and 14,000 from Slovakia. People believe that Mr. brunner lived in Damascus, the Syrian capital under the name “Gerog Fisher”.

 This is a very surprising thing to know. To know that a former Nazi escaped a death sentence and lived in a country with a different name and no one noticing. It’s also very sad to know what this terrible man has done and that he still escaped his death sentence. But you also know that the world isn’t a great place and that bad things happen.           

5-  Missing for Four Days, Kosta Karageorge, an Ohio State Defensive Lineman, Is Found Dead by: Tim Rohan

In the article “Missing for Four Days, Kosta Karageorge, an Ohio State Defensive Lineman, Is Found Dead” by: Tim Rohan is about the death of Kosta Karageorge. Kosta was found dead Sunday from a “self-inflicted” gunshot wound. His body was also found in a trash bin and a handgun next him. Kosta’s family believes that he went missing because of his concussion and his history with concussions. His sister explains how he felt after his latest concussion. She says “Just like, confusion, disorientation, being unable to focus, mood swings — not feeling like himself”. Kosta also sent text messages to his mother saying that he was sorry for being an embarrassment and his wrestling coach saying that he loved him

.This article shows how someone can change after a serious injury. His sister says that after the last concussion that he changed. He acted different. Kosta seemed to be sadder and I think depressed because he didn’t feel like himself anymore. This lets you know how serious injuries can be and also if it was caused because of football, it can show how dangerous sports can be. I think that is sad because we lost a young man because of an injury and how much it changed his mind

Reflection

Those 5 articles I chose were all dealing with something bad in the world. The first one deals with ray rice beating his wife and if he was able to play football again. The second one I did deals with how a mom deals with a drug and how it affects her family and her neighborhood. The third one deals with how Al shabaab is killing innocent people in Kenya because Kenya is sending troops from their country to help African peacekeepers. The fourth one deals with a Nazi and how he was a part of the holocaust and his death. The fifth one deal’s with how a young man named kosta was affected by an injury and how he affected other people because of this. I realized how the world isn’t always amazing. A lot of bad things take place in the world and sometimes we can’t stop it. I also realized how one person or a group of people can have an effect on the whole world