Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury, is a story set in the future. Many things are different, but one of the biggest changes from today is that books are banned. In the story, there is no particular reason why books are banned, but in the story, Ray Bradbury does a good job of hinting why they might be.

The first reason on why books might be banned is because the government doesn’t want citizens to read books and become more educated on how a government is supposed to work, and will see the flaws in their own, and all the citizens might protest or even start a riot. of course the government doesn’t want this to happen, so they restrict access to knowledge, and one of the biggest ways to obtain knowledge is by read. Additionally, people might not like to feel not as smart because they have read less, so the citizens might have voted to ban books. It is important for a government to have power, or else no one would listen to the laws. So the government must restrict people from finding out how a government should be run so they maintain power, because if citizens today knew the government was taking advantage of them, they would surely not take them seriously.   

The second reason books might be banned is because people might not have the attention span because of all of the TVs and the earbuds that play different sounds. Because people only do these things, aside from working. For example Montag's wife only watches tv and rarely goes outside or talks to Montag. Because nobody has the patience to read books, they were just banned to stop the competition between the books and the electronics.

Because the government doesn't want to give the citizens knowledge to overthrow them or because of the competition between the books and the electronics are valid reasons for the books to be banned.

Animal farm post

Animal Farm Blog Post                                                                                               3/24/15

In the story, Animal Farm, there is a farm called the Manor Farm. The owner of the farm, Mr. Jones is hated by the animals, because they believe that humans take everything from animals, and give nothing in return. Old Major, a pig, tells the animals they must rebel against the humans and take the farm for themselves. Old major dies before the rebellion happens, but it is successful and the animals take over the farm.The animals come up with new a new religion and make their own rules for the farm. George Orwell, uses animals in the story to depict the Russian Revolution, with different symbols and characters representing different things.

    The most obvious and important similarities are the characters. Mr. Jones, the human owner of the farm is Tsar Nicholas Ⅱ. This is shown because Mr. Jones is evil to his animals, just like the Tsar of Russia was to his citizens. Snowball is a  pig that is leading the farm at first. He represents Trotsky, one of the leaders in the revolution. Napoleon is Stalin in Animal Farm. He Exiles Snowball just like how Stalin exiles Trotsky during the revolution. Another example of this connection between the Russian revolution and Animal Farm is Boxer. In the book, Boxer represents the working class people. He does a majority of the work on the farm, just like the citizens did in Russia. Almost all the characters in the story are somehow linked to people or groups involved  in the Russian revolution.

Another similarity between the the two are symbols. The first one is the flag for the animal farm. This is supposed to represent the hammer and sickle, the symbol of the USSR. Another example is animalism, a way of life created by the animals. This symbolizes communism. Almost all aspects of the revolution are covered in symbols in Animal Farm.

To conclude, Animal Farm is an analogy for the Russian revolution. Some reasons George Orwell might have used animals instead of using the real people may have been because is was scared of being discovered for writing poorly about Russia's leader, Stalin, who in animal farm he depicts him as being selfish and cruel, just like he was in real life.

1/7/15

Dear Ms. Berner,

We have heard the the administration has been receiving emails regarding removing certain books from our libraries. These books may include topics about drugs, sex, violence, racism and other more mature content. I feel that removing these books from the libraries would not benefit the M.S 51 reading community, but it might hurt it.

To begin, many banned books teach important lessons that its readers might not learn without reading the book. As said by Jen Doll “...the majority of our favorite books might have been sourced directly from the banned books ‘top 100’ list -the honor of number one on that list, for the record, goes to Alvin Scwartz’s Scary Stories series. Not only were these books ones we read intently, and over and over agan, they were the books that taught us important things :Like Jen Doll stated, these books teach us important lessons, and without them, we might never learn them. Additionally, Jen Doll continues to say how the good books were the ones that were banned. “Over and over again, the books worth reading were the banned ones.”

Secondly, reading about harsher topics are better for kids to learn about them then not knowing about them. Jen Doll also says that “...book banners and protective parents or maybe even folks without kids would have you believe that this sort of stuff will hurt the minds of young readers, will disturb them, will be bad for them.” What Jen is trying to say is that many people think that reading about mature topics is not meant for kids and should be banned in schools, but these topics are not even too harmful for the age group that it is meant for. The Hunger Games for example, is meant for teens and young adults, not 3rd graders. But parents who ban books in middle and high school are being too hard on the books and not letting their children experience reading about different topics, when they are at the age when they could be.

Some may say that banning books is a positive way to filter what kids read. For example, if a reader had experienced something in their life that might bring back a bad memory or give them post traumatic stress because of something they read something harsh. Additionally, banning also gets kids more curious about what the book is about, and will gravitate towards a banned book rather than a non-banned one. As Jen states “I honestly don’t think that banning a book ruins its reputation or makes children afraid to read it. If anything , the opposite will happen.” When something becomes censored, children become more curious, and read it just because of the censorship.

To conclude, I feel that banning books would hurt the 51 libraries more than help. It would take away books we love and that teach us important lessons. I feel that if someone has a problem reading a book because of its explicit content, then they shouldn’t read the book, not take it away from others who might want to. Because we aren’t in elementary school, I think all YA books should be present in MS.51 libraries.

                                                                 From   

     Miles Mukamal