What Would Scroggins Say? Annie On My Mind by Nancy Garden

In honor of Banned Books Week, and in light of criticism of Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler and Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. by a certain Morality Judge of the World (Hey there Mr. Scroggins! And I didn't even know you were running!), I've started wondering what he would have to say about other great and important books... I'm sure that it was incredibly hard for him to narrow down the choices to only three. But, since he didn't impose give his opinion on other books, we'll just have to guesstimate!

So here's my first "WWSS?" post... The book being Scrogginspected is Annie On My Mind, by Nancy Garden.

What Would Scroggins Say?: This book is a danger to teens and young adults. It is an enticement to the fragile, developing brain of impressionable youngsters to engage in PORNOGRAPHY and HOMOSEXUALITY! The teens in this book are RULE BREAKERS! One of the girls even set up an EAR PIERCING station in the school, which caused ear infections! This girl is the STUDENT BODY PRESIDENT! Is this the role model you wish your children to aspire to be? On several occasions, they bare their IMAGINATIONS in public! They even utilize the empty home of a TEACHER for their DALLIANCES, although it's no wonder, since the students obviously picked up the GAY VIBES from the teachers themselves, which, much like a parasite burrowed into the IMAGINATION of the students and spread like a disease! IT'S CONTAGIOUS! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!! The progression from becoming GAY to engaging in BESTIALITY and NECROPHILIA is a slippery slope! PROTECT THE CHILDREN!!

What I Say: All jokes aside, it scares me that people actually DO think like that. It's a ridiculous and insidious fear-based method of control. People who think this way are afraid, and so they seek to spread their influence through fear in order to control others.

So let me say this now: There is no need to fear people who simply choose to love a little differently than you do.
Annie On My Mind is a celebration of finding oneself and finding someone to accept and love you for who you are. This book is about courage and understanding and strength and conviction. This book is about standing up for what is right, not simply what is easy. This book is about telling the world that nobody has the right to tell anyone else where their happiness should come from.

Wesley Scroggins gives me a reason to fear - but it's not the one he intended. In his closed-minded judgment, in his willingness to dictate what should be taught - not just to his own children, or even his own classes, but the entire school, and surely beyond, if he can manage it, and in his ignorance and twisted perceptions of what constitutes "pornography", he frightens me.

Do not let ignorance like that Mr. Scroggins has shown dictate your lives. His arguments against Speak, Twenty Boy Summer and Slaughterhouse-Five are ridiculous. He is ridiculous for trying to stifle free expression and thought, for trying to stifle creativity and art, for trying to stifle learning and knowledge. Hopefully you think my parody of his type of arguments is equally ridiculous.

We need to move forward toward progress and understanding and acceptance, not backwards into hatred and fear and superstition. That is all. 

If you would like to do your own "What Would Scroggins Say?" parody, I'd love to see it! Please link to your post below. :)