The brainlessness of an English Tutor. Fuming

[crazymomma93]

Long time lurker, please bear with me.
My DD12 has been having some issues with her reading book. It has been making her feel uncomfortable, from the Genre and style of writing. So I have looked into it, got a jist of the book, she has pointed out some bits that made her uneasy and I looked up the age rating which was 14+. Now typically if you knew me, you would know I am not "that Mom" but I emailed her Form Tutor to ask if there was an alternative. Tutor emailed back after talking to English dept and DD dosn't need to read the book any longer, she can bring in her own. No problem. My DD has just told me she spoke with her own English Tutor, the day before I sent the email to tell her Form Tutor. After listening to DD, English Tutor responds "it's just words"
ITS JUST WORDS? Sorry is that not pretty much the Tutors whole career, teaching English?
I need calming because I am close to emailing said teacher calling her a c**t, because, you know "it's just words". See how her feelings are when she reads something that makes her uncomfortable.
My DD turned to her to ask because the book was making her uneasy and that is the response. What about children who get verbally bullied? Where is this Womans morals. AIBU?

Define 'child' here - when I was 15 my peers were definitely reading that stuff on the sly. We all turned out pretty well. These days it's different because of the amount of truly awful material that is available online, so parents need to be savvy and vigilant.

True story - my daughter only read books in Maltese, and the first English book she brought home, when in single digits, from the school library, was The Chocolate War. Of course I had to help her read it, and I was disgusted. I went to the school and spoke to the librarian and said it was not suitable for children. She implied that I was 'that mother' and I asked her whether she had even read the book, and she said no. I said 'There you are...' at which she bristled, and said 'What bad things could there be in a book with such an innocuous title?' So I totally understand what you are saying. These people are simply warming their seats, as we say here. I did contact the HoS, by e-mail, but I didn't even get an acknowledgement. So... there you are. I let it go, but my child did not read the book.

@Tanjamaltija nobody is saying that schools do not sometimes get books wrong. But in OP's case the book was age appropriate. In the case of other posters on this thread, the issue was that tbooks clashed with their personal and/or religious beliefs - the solution to which is to home educate or live with it.

@pointythings Be that as it may, the reply was flippant, and rude, and dismissive; the feelings of the child do not matter, because the adults know what is good for them. It's like they did her a huge favour, allowing her to take her own book. And since they allowed her - why didn't they make an open session, where each child may take a book, as long as they are reading, within limits? That way, children will read more, if the topic is one they find interesting - cars, fashion, science fiction... whatever.

@Tanjamaltija I don't disagree with you that your DD's school handled this badly. But it is not relevant to OP's post.

"My DD12 has been having some issues with her reading book. It has been making her feel uncomfortable".

I think the reason why people of my generation were more world ready leaving our childhood is that we were put into challenging spaces all the time as children. I remember when I was 12 finding and reading a copy of Five Chimneys while staying with grandmother. It's a biography by Olga Lengyel recounting her time at Auschwitz-Birkenau. I was devastated, I wasn't aware of the Holocaust, it was a revelation and her account of her time in the camps isn't children's fiction. When my mother and grandmother found out why I was being quiet, they encouraged me to finish the book not to put it down. It became another lesson in life, how in recent history some dreadful things have happened. This book was treated as part of me growing up. Some lessons are uncomfortable, just like how scared I was when I was 6 and I had to go and buy milk by myself or when I started to walk to primary school by myself when I was 8. It was all part of growing up, training to be become bolder and more resilient. Resilient is the key word here that today's children struggle with. The question as a parent and teacher is when and how are these challenges are to be provided and these life lessons to be learned. They can't be put off forever, suddenly to be incurred all at once when they are in their late teens because these life challenges can no longer be avoided. This is a part of the reason why late teens / early twenties are so anxious these days, they've remained too long in non-judgmental safe spaces.

I think it's really important to help a young person to have boundaries about what they do and don't feel comfortable with. I haven't read the eve of man book but the concept seems a bit....off.

@Pointythings The book the OP talked about had an age rating higher than that of the child who was reading it.

Did it? I believe it's rated 12 to 14, and OP'S DD is 12.