The brainlessness of an English Tutor. Fuming

So a book about basically lust, making her uneasy, I do not think at 12 years old she should have to read.

Since that is not what it is about, it does show that you haven't read it. My granddaughter loves the books. As an adult I think that some of the story line is simplistic and some of the issues could be explored better - but I am an adult and it is written for young people. Some will like it and some won't. But you should never judge a book by its cover - if you think its an inappropriate read then read it yourself first.

That said, "love", "lust" and everything in between are going to be raising their heads very soon if they haven't yet, and it is an opportunity to explore what makes her uncomfortable and why. If it's sickly sweet romance, I am probably with her on that one. But if we are talking about the "real world" as we know it, there may be opportunities to grab. That is, after all, what dystopian novels are about - making us think about the world we live in, where it might go, what we would do if faced with those situations etc. They are not supposed to be comfortable reads.

OK, the update is a level of batshit that I struggle to compute.

In the way in which the matter was first brought to me, I stand by being gobsmacked. How dare a teacher minimise the feelings of a child. But as I said the conversation was more indepth than that.

So although it did not happen, you reserve the right to feel angry about the thing that did not happen?

I tried to delete the thread but the years Ive been on here, I actually don't know how it works. Thank you to those who understood what I was trying to say.

You can click on 'Report' on any of your posts and ask MNHQ to remove the thread. They don't always but you can ask. I would.

"How dare a teacher minimise the feelings of a child."

You've already said DD twisted the narrative. So...

Surely adults caring for children are also there to try and help them navigate their feelings, which includes reassuring them and sometimes that means "minimising" worries about something that doesn't really matter, such as a book.

Can't believe my post was deleted! An English teacher who thinks books are just words that don't and can't affect people....I despair, honestly.

Recommended as 12-15 by the biggest online bookseller in Sweden.

They don’t, or at least they shouldn’t.

If there is damage done by words to anyone, why do adults need trigger warnings on Literature and course content in universities ?

Poor poor kids. Their minds are being destroyed.

12 year olds have smart phones, i would have thought the sensitivity ship had sailed a long time ago

You sound absolutely insane and you need to get a grip. You absolutely ARE 'that mom' and if you keep acting like this your daughter is going to be 'that kid' too. Christ alive. Calm the fuck down.

Films are just films but we don't we don't let 11 year olds watch 18 films for a reason

So my son read 1984 at the beginning of secondary school when he still seemed a 'young' type, and started dropping the word 'rape' into random sentences (because of the book) as if it was a normal thing to say. Had a chat with him but it was horrible and kind of a nasty way to bridge that age of growing up a bit. Still makes me sad.

This is what I was going to say, loads of people are saying a pp's post was too graphic and reported it, but surely it was 'just words'.... I've got an example of my son reading something I thought was too graphic but will post separately in case deleted. And loads of my kids books have age ratings on the back, I can see them with my eyes.

You’ve read their children’s books, or you have specifically read THIS particular YA novel….? I would venture to ask - if it was that dire, why you say “books”. Clearly not dire enough to stop you reading more than one…..

As to your comments on Richard Osman - I think the other thing that’s the issue here is people are conflating “I don’t like it” with “this book is badly written”. Personally, I hated Wolf Hall. I found it dull and ponderous and I abandoned a 3rd of the way through. Does that mean I think Hilary Mantell is a bad writer or the book is badly written? No. It just wasn’t for me. You may not care for Richard Osman’s books, but they have rounded characters, a strong structure and a well developed plot. They are technically well written books and that isn’t in any way diminished by him being a celebrity.

Plenty of books out there are utterly dreadful, and plenty of celebrities do have vanity published drivel, but it is neither true nor fair to say that nobody who initially became known for something else can write good books.

More that a phrase regarding a terrible form of abuse is used correctly. Rather than trivialised...

We can read the OP as written and then advise from that to say she needs to know more about the conversation, as I have said.

Your replies have been deeply unpleasant in your trivialisation of gaslighting

The law should also be changed to ensure that there are approved books which are of literary value and that strict age limits put on books which need to be strictly adhered to by teachers and input on this should come both from independent academics with expertise around literature and with professionals with expertise around child development and decisions to be made jointly.

Oof the snobbery about "literary value". Books that are now considered classics weren't written as classics. Dickens published his stories originally as serials, essentially a print version of a weekly TV drama. Most "classics" were panned by at least one critic in their day. As said above, Shakespeare was peddling mass entertainment and would probably have laughed if he knew the regard his work would later be held in.

I think you'd also find that decisions would never be made "jointly" by academics in 2 such different fields because they'd have very different ideas about suitability. Even within the same field ideas will vary.

And all of this starts to get worryingly close to disturbing level of censorship.

I've read the children's books by those two, they are dire and we donated them
I've read Richard Osman's book and wouldn't expect that to be produced in an English literature class either, it's not got any great merit and I am sure would not have been published if he wasn't a "name"

How the phrase gaslighting is used is something you clearly feel strongly about. I’m sorry if you’ve been on the receiving end of that.

You're right that we don’t know the entire conversation or full context. We can only do what any of us are doing in any post on MN. Reply to the OP as it is written. Most of the replies say nothing about not knowing the bigger conversation. Quite a few are personally nasty to / about the OP.

in the context of what information we have, I don’t agree with that teacher’s response. Now I’m off to work and won’t come back to this thread. I found many of the responses deeply unpleasant for a multitude of reasons.

You haven’t READ the book. So you aren’t remotely qualified to judge if it’s shite or not.

Shock horror, famous people who are good at one thing are perfectly capable of being good at another. Tom Fletcher - a man who writes chart topping songs, might well be excellent at writing books. Richard Osman started out writing quiz questions. This doesn’t mean he isn’t also capable of writing excellent books.

As he’s been lauded on here by several of your ilk, you may be interested to know that before Charles Dickens wrote most of his novels, he had started out briefly as an actor, and was already famous as a journalist. Shakespeare was already famous as an actor when he first published . Is their work “celebrity shite”….?

Yes let's ignore your complete trivialisation of gaslighting, which is not just "You're wrong and here's why you could think about it differently" but a sustain abuse technique to make the victim feel lost and confused and like they are losing their grip on reality...

We don't KNOW the teacher wasn't talking to the girl about her feelings towards the book and used the words or similar sentiment to "their only words" as part of a bigger discussion but those were the only ones DD has picked up on.

OP’s child is not 8 either. She is secondary school age.

If you had genuinely read the classics, you would know that the darkest parts of those can be absolutely terrifying. Equally, if you’d read any of the “utter grim gobshite” as you call it that you are railing against, you’d see that you are wrong. Modern books have merit in their own way. When Shakespeare was written, He wasn’t “the Great Bard”, he was churning out contemporary entertainment for the masses. His work was the Eastenders of its day. Look at the regard it’s held in now.

As to age appropriateness, the particular book OP is talking about is recommended as 14+ on Amazon, 13+ by the publishers and OP’s DD is 12. That’s hardly a wild developmental leap that would be considered age inappropriate. The teacher isn’t peddling American Psycho to preschoolers. Yes, literature should be age appropriate but a book for mid-teens being read by a 12 year old is perfectly acceptable.

Lastly, I would say that advocating for enforced censorship in education would be both incredibly stupid and damaging to children and young people. Literature is important. A variety of literature is important. Who gets to decide? People like you who clearly haven’t even read Dickens and just think it’s a grand name to throw about in a debate?

What you actually are is someone throwing a hissy fit over books they’ve never even read, which is just a bit sad really. If you’d like to actually learn, and maybe explore some of the modern YA literature available and actually read the classics, I’d be happy to make some recommendations.

It’s fair enough to question whether the content of a book is suitable for a pupil but you complained and they said she doesn’t have to read it. Your further complaint is that a teacher used the phrase ‘just words’. I presume the teacher was trying to help your dc not be upset. So what next? You email the class teacher making them feel shit. Class teacher has to lose PPA time to reply to your complaint. You have gained nothing further from your complaint and class teacher has had their time wasted. This is a clear example of the stuff teachers have to deal with. A secondary teacher will see hundreds of pupils a week. Imagine if just one tenth of the parents sent in silly complaints like this.