Mark Twain--you're ruining my life.

I don't know where I want to go with this essay. I have tried and tried to motivate myself for it but the fact that I don't care the slightest bit about the topic has put quite a burden on my shoulders. The only things that I have to say is that mom was freaking off the wall insane, and if she cares so much about her daughter reading Huck Finn then she should take her daughter out of the class for the duration of the time that they will be focusing on the topic; instead of making a total fool of herself. Personally I don't think that Huck stressed the issue to the extent that he should have. This novel was almost written in a child's perspective, you know how children can see the broader picture but not notice the details? Take sex for example, Mommy is all of a sudden pregnant and a stork will soon drop off the baby that is magically extracted from her stomach on the front step, they don't question how it got into her stomach in the first place, they will just go with the flow and think all is true about what they have been told without further investigation. In a way they are blind to reality. This is the way Huck is with the issue of slavery and demeaning the blacks by using the word Nigger. He has seen and heard it being used therefore he thinks that it is hunky dory for him to use it as well. He does not consider the fact that it might as well be offensive to Jim or to others of the race, it is merely a word representing a color. Adding on to this, I think that we should be exposed to a novel that really illustrates the brutality of the time, as we were while studying the holocaust. We need to take in the fact that slavery was a very real issue and it did happen. People were treated horribly, and history should never repeat itself. Yet why cover it up, it is history, it is what it is. There was no silver lining to it, and thus there shouldn't be any sheltering of what had happened in any novel related to the issue. Moreover, if we are going to be reading a book that is racist (whether or not you find Huck Finn racist, so be it) we should also read a book that is racist toward whites as well. This is not something that we see often, and I think that it would be an interesting followup or even pre-read to a book such as Huck Finn; maybe then people can stop freaking out and come to the conclusion that racism is not only focused on blacks, but the other way as well (being on whites). This was a really lousy book, not that I disliked it, but all of the controversy that it stirred up is ridiculous and I can't wait to be finished with the whole bit. Mark Twain has got to be rolling over in his grave laughing his ass off at all that he has stirred up. [To anyone that is reading this please do not take offense to anything I said, and if you do leave a comment, I do not care]