Mostly they say stuff like, "See you around. Maybe."

[halfshellvenus]

Got some feedback on the Anonymous Writing Meme, and it's so hard not to be discouraged by the negative. One person finds my porn "clinical," which is the kiss of death, and has comments worth considering but seems to dislike my writing enough that I wonder if there's a mismatch in stylistic "goals," so to speak. A few others complain about the

Comments

[resounding_echo]

I don't recall hunting for fur instead of food in that book. Or, at least, don't they hunt for their livelihood? That is, they use the fur? I'm of the opinion that these texts that have content you disapprove of could be seen as an opportunity for discussion, rather than something to be withheld. There are good reasons for you to disapprove of hunting, but alternately there is also a strong argument as to why people hunted in those areas at that specific time. I'm certain the teacher could give Christopher an alternate assignment if you'd rather he not read the text. But in my fifth grade class, I'm fairly certain we read chapters of that book aloud in class

[halfshellvenus]

The main character wants to hunt racoons to sell their pelts.

It's not so much the right/wrong thing, it's the vivid descriptions of the hunting and the eventual awful thing that happens to a human in the book that are so disturbing.

I'm reading "Birdwing" to Christopher at bedtime right now, and some of the descriptions of passing animal destruction are what he considers "TMI"-- and that's after I paraphrase them! They're germaine to the story, and the main character is himself part bird, but they're still... icky.

You definitely remember correctly about the sadness thing, though that's more Lauren than Christopher. Once she gets inside deep sadness, it's hard for her to get out (I share that problem).

That book destroyed me when I first read it, but not in a bad way.Because of what happened to the secondary human character who was killed, the book made me feel... dirty. Mentally dirty, as if something ugly was in my head that I couldn't ever get out again. Which is a totally different kind of situation than you experience from

[resounding_echo]

...is it horrible that I don't remember what happens to the human character? I just remember the dogs dying. :(

I almost bought Birdwing at a used bookstore the other day--should I have?

I dunno. I don't have children (obviously) and only know about kids through my nieces and kid brother (who is nearly fifteen now), but I always thought it more harmful than helpful to withhold disturbing material. But this just could be my personal relation. I much preferred to be exposed to things at a young age (maybe even a too young age) than feel sheltered from them. In a weird way I think it would have been more difficult to be exposed to these things after I felt ready for them. But of course I'm a freak who can handle a lot of things and thinks it necessary to be explicitly exposed to the harsher aspects of life and human nature and matured probably too early. And I know, if nothing else than from my second-grade-teacher-friend, that not all children are this way and we must keep all their abilities in mind.

Did you ever see Wendy and

[halfshellvenus]

...is it horrible that I don't remember what happens to the human character? I just remember the dogs dying. :(
Nobody seems to remember the human except me! Axe to the stomach and bleeding to death all over the ground-- accidental, but just as sickening and gory. :(

That's the part that really disturbed me. The rest was bad enough, but that part was too much.

Birdwing LOOKED interesting, but I have no firm opinion yet. The main character is painfully immature, and has a level of petulance to rival Luke Skywalker in the first Star Wars movie. So far, he hasn't smartened up much. :0

[resounding_echo]

Oh yeah, yeah--he falls on the axe, correct? I just remember that afterward the boy finds his dog whimpering in the bush, with thorns and debris littering his intestines in the stomach wound. Oh, I cried so hard

[halfshellvenus]

GOOD CALL! See I find that MUCH more concerning than the violent and grim realities of life;
Ah, but see-- that's because you're female, and for women this is where the issues lie.

The concern with boys is violence, particularly sensationalizing and desensitizing violence. With girls, it's sex/body-image/jadedness. My sister used to go on about how they "didn't allow toy guns in their house" and I kept thinking, "With two girls, that's a non-issue. Even if one of them's a tomboy, you'll never run into the kill-kill-kill problem people have with boys."

OTOH, we started getting asked repeatedly if it was OK for Lauren to see such-and-such PG-13 movie that my sister's girls were watching while we stayed with them. The oldest was 13, so she was letting the just-11 daughter watch them too (which I couldn't disagree with more). "Legally Blonde"-- with someone "earning her grades on her knees" and other blowjob references. Lots of movies with sexual references and body-issues (the same mother who wouldn't let her girls have Barbies until

[resounding_echo]

Did you ever see This Film Is Not Rated? It's a good documentary, even if it tends toward trying to amuse too much some of the time (a la Michael Moore, but not nearly as bad). One of the most interesting parts was the interview with Kevin Smith where he said that he thinks the rating system towards violence is completely backwards. A movie gets a PG-13 rating if there's gun fire but no blood, even if it's rapid fire gunning of multiple people. However movies like Saving Private Ryan get adult ratings because of the graphic violence, when he thinks it should be the opposite; adults should only be allowed to view fictionalized and stylized violence as they are mature enough to understand how unrealistic it is, while younger folks should be exposed to realistic portrayals of violence, ones that do not glorify and are certain to show all the grim consequences of violence.

Not an argument a lot of people would agree with, but an interesting one to say the least.