In Our House, Dr. Seuss Was Contraband | Hacker News Reader

In Our House, Dr. Seuss Was Contraband

theatlantic.com

Can somebody point me to an article that clearly explains exactly what content of Dr. Seuss is problematic? All articles I googled, seem to assume the reader knows the subject and simply writes about the banning of these six books. Genuinely curious, I only have good memories of various Dr. Seuss books and know I never associated it with a racist outlook (however casual) as a child.

Here are some pics:

https://diazhub.com/australia/read-across-america-day-biden-...

And a 2017 article that goes into extreme depth investigating Seuss's work: https://www.pragmaticmom.com/2017/05/examining-dr-seuss-raci...

(IMO the article is a bit over the top and doesn't try to separate racist work from work that was created in a racist or just "white American" perspective, but wherever your line is drawn, it does include a lot of valid criticism of Seuss's body of work)

This article also points out that you might not notice the more-casual casual racism in Seuss if you're white and unaware of your own casually racist/xenophobic/majoritarian attitudes.

It's interesting to think about the author who had this childhood gre up to be a senior writer at The Root, a Black activist zine with an very strong tint in its perspective on affairs.

> So, calm down—Dr. Seuss hasn’t been “canceled.”

This talking point keeps getting repeated over and over online in what I assume is an attempt to downplay "cancel culture" and portray mostly conservatives and concerned liberals as knee-jerk reactionaries. However, Dr. Seuss got dropped from Read Across America Day despite the annual tradition of him being included.[1] Many schools have said they're not technically "banning" Dr. Seuss, just not talking about him much anymore.[2] And online bookstores and resellers have made some of his books forbidden and have exercised their power to deem some of his images offensive or not.[3]

It's unclear what the status of Dr. Seuss will be in a year from now, but it's not hard to imagine his very name becoming just toxic enough not to bother with. This is textbook cancelation. Yet any attempt to point out that this is how it begins is routinely given dismissive "slippery slope fallacy, bro" type arguments. Yes, we know Dr. Seuss Enterprises can protect its IP and not publish whatever they like. Not the issue at hand. We're talking about a slow (or not so slow) reframing of the author's entire reputation. Maybe I'm wrong, but it's also ok to be a frog in the water and wonder out loud whether the temperature is rising and we might get boiled someday.

[1] https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-joe-biden-break-dr-seuss...

[2] https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/01/us/loudoun-county-public-scho...

[2] https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/books/story/2021-...

[3] https://www.wsj.com/articles/dr-seuss-books-deemed-offensive...

Does Dr Seuss have a right to be the centerpiece of children's literature for all time? What's wrong to moving on to other books?

Why is it OK to "cancel" everything that isn't Dr Seuss?

As long as its not the government doing it, its seems like free choice of association.

> We're talking about a slow (or not so slow) reframing of the author's entire reputation.

The author's reputation to who? Clearly the author already had this new reputation, and it's just becoming more widely adopted.

I'm not sure I fully understand what your outrage is. It seems like you're concerned that judgements of acceptability change over time. Is that not to be expected?

Not outraged, just politely criticizing the all-or-nothing attitude. As I cited, the cancelation of Dr. Seuss as an author may have begun. Maybe not. It's fair to wonder about this. I don't much care for some obscure, racist books that will no longer be published. I do care about these obscure books now standing in for his entire oeuvre and making him a de facto, toxic author not worth teaching or associating with. Wanting to tap the brakes on this "cancel culture" is a reasonable response, in my opinion.

> ... in what I assume is an attempt to downplay "cancel culture" and portray mostly conservatives and concerned liberals as knee-jerk reactionaries.

Question your assumptions.

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