Do you think 'The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn' is racist and therefore it should be banned if so why?

Question

Thank you all, I don't think it is racist, nor is Mark Twain, but for a school project we have to get feed back from other people.

Answer 1

Some people have gotten upset about "Huckleberry Finn" because it fails to embody current social and cultural attitudes about race. While Twain's treatment of the runaway slave Jim, who accompanies Huck, may seem condescending by contemporary standards, he continually shows Jim to be a nobler man than the racist white people they encounter. Twain uses the mid-19th century toleration of slavery to viciously satirize conventional morality and values.

I don't agree with the banning of any book. Removal of "Huckleberry Finn" from school libraries and reading lists only serves as a demonstration of ignorance and small-mindedness. However, I think it's appropriate, before using the book in a classroom, to consider whether the students are mature enough to appreciate the cultural context of the book and understand that its use of racial epithets is ironic and intended to reflect on the racism of society.

Answer 2

No, the book is not racist.
Some of the characters in the story may have been racist, but that was not held in the same way then as it is now.
This is a story. It is told in a manner reflecting the time period it was written in. The story itself would not have the same effect or have given the same image of the time period if the subject of race had been glossed over.
How can a book even be racist unless it's advocating or calling upon the readers to be racist-- to make judments of people based on their skin color or heritage? Readers aren't told that racism is okay or that they should be that way.
How could anyone ever ban a book because of an idea or attitude expressed by imaginary people!!?!!
What about all the songs and shows and jokes and books and blogs and everything that go on NOW? The ones that our kids are listening to and reading from people they see and hear on tv or radio daily that advocate drugs, sex, and violence?
Why worry and try to defame a book written so long ago?
Does anyone really think that having their school-age child read this book will make them become a racist or think that racism is okay?

Answer 3

Not much more to say that has not been said. Mark Twain was not a racist. He demonstrates in his writing that Jim was considered as a human being and not a certain color. Books such as Huck Finn should not be banned because it gives us an idea of history and how we can make better changes in the here and now.

Answer 4

i think of that's between the suitable novels written by way of an American author. Huck is an engaging character, fallacious yet heroic. he's, in spite of each and every little thing, arranged to pass to hell particularly than betray Jim, it fairly is fairly noble of him. The e book is humorous, and crammed with memorable characters. Banning it may well be an act of insanity. The e book purely disappoints interior the previous few chapters, the place it reverts to this type of 'Tom Sawyer'. I easily have no longer something against 'tom Sawyer' which i think of is a maximum suitable e book, yet Huckleberry Finn is a distinctive variety of e book altogether, and that i think of Twain would desire to have been waiting to think of up a extra helpful ending. i'm in simple terms an informal reader.

Answer 5

Banning a book is an exercise in CONTROL. One group wants to impose their will over another, usually larger group. They do this by being very vocal and counting on the larger group not to be.

No book should be banned. Huckleberry Finn got banned because a very vocal group cried racism and others bought it without reading the book. If they had read it, they would have known that Huck was anti-slavery as was Twain and that he was the hero.

Answer 6

If it was written in the current era then it would be inappropriate, but this book is a reflection of a diferent time where lives and lifestyles were racist - and that is how it was. Banning the book would not change the past, having access to the book helps us to understand what life used to be like so we can appreciate how times have changed since then.

Answer 7

Personally, I am not a fan of Huck Finn. I read it for English and we were forced to pick certain aspects of the chapters for analyzing. Not fun, and while I did stop reading at chapter...twenty-two or so, the book had a classic Victorian state of mind. Yes the book itself contains much racism as
the United States is notorious for their struggle to end/keep Slavery, and that's part of what Twain was elaborating on.

Part of Finn's struggle when he's out on that river is the force of himself realizing that his companion is a human being just as like himself, and the color of someone's skin doesn't make them inferior. Finn goes through several emotions dealing with this.

Answer 8

Huck Finn is not a racist novel
Mark Twain is noted as being adamently pro-civil rights during his life.
if it seems racist, twain purposely wrote it that way to be ironic.

Answer 9

I suppose the only reason one would ban a book for racism in the first place is because it is just so likely to inflame violence. This might be a good argument for banning "Mein Kaumpf" in post-war Germany, but, certainly, these sort of books are few and far between--having more to do with contemporary circumstance than the book itself. I don't think there to be any circumstances where this classic american novel would fit in the categorie of "inflammatory unto violence."

Answer 10

It's been years since I read it, but I don't recall thinking anything about it was inappropriate...it was accurate for the time it represented and there's no reason to ban it.

Are we going to ban every book that represents attitudes from a time period which we no longer hold?