“I want to protect children from evil, not fill their minds with it,” Mallory said. “The ‘Harry Potter’ books teach children and adults that witchcraft is OK for children.”
[...]
At Thursday’s hearing, Mallory spoke against the books along with four other parents and students. One of them was Stacy Thomas, a mother of five, who said reading the “Harry Potter” series made her daughter turn to witchcraft, ultimately causing their Christian family to lose friends, finances and their reputation. Her daughter, Jordan Fusch, 15, testified that she began experimenting with tarot cards, curses and seances after reading the books.
“As a former witch, I can tell you that witchcraft is not fantasy. ... I felt I could not escape the clutches of witchcraft,” Fusch said. “It has taken several years of counseling to get to where I was before witchcraft and reading ‘Harry Potter’ books.”
Wait, stop the crazy train right here. What?! This girl is fifteen and it took "several years of counseling" to "escape the clutches of witchcraft"? What the hell? I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess, given the statments, that she read the books when she was, oh, eleven and thought they were neat. Parents freaked out when they lost "friends, finances and their reputation" (side note: finances, wtf?). Sent girl to a therapy not unlike the so-called "reparative therapy" fundie parents send their gay kids to. Just a guess.
Next up is a parent who smacked these people around:
A mother of three, Laura Bowen, whose entire family had read and enjoyed the books, said most students are able to distinguish that the content of the books is not factual.
“A child who is unable to recognize the difference between fantasy and reality is either too young or too immature to read them, or has issues bigger than removing the ‘Harry Potter’ books is going to solve,” Bowen said.
*SNAP!*
Then came testimony from a reading specialist who testified on how she has seen the series make interested readers out of otherwise literary-apathetic kids and also from the school system’s director of media and information services who stated she received over 250 letters of support for the books.
Then, just when you think things are going well and the IQ level was starting to rise, this person decided to speak:
Gaye Bruce, a parent volunteer at Alton C. Crews Middle School, said she wanted to see the books removed even if they inspired children to read.
“I could counter that argument by saying any topic like ‘How to be a terrific terrorist’ or ‘Car Bombing 101’ could be used to entice children to read,” Bruce said.
Yes, that's right. Terrorism! The perfect catch-all for getting rid of anything you don't like. How much money do you want to bet someone is going to use this exact argument to try and remove books like King and King?
The article noted that some of the high school kids rock--they sat silently in the back and wore t-shirts that said: “Censorship Destroys Education" (which someone should market because I would buy that shirt).
The board members received copies of the books and of the arguments from both sides. They have ten days to decide on the books and will probably do so at the next meeting on May 11th.
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