To Kill A Mockingbird and our never ending battle with racism

As probably every teenager on the face of the planet, I was forced to read books for English class that I didn't enjoy. However, when I read To Kill a Mockingbird, it immediately became my favorite book and remains in that top spot to this day.

I think perhaps it was the first time I really thought about social injustice. I know racism and all kinds of bigotry were present, but I mean, I was still a kid. I didn't notice things like that really. It would be nice to stay blissfully ignorant, but the fact is, we can't. As far as we've come since Harper Lee wrote about good and evil, injustice and social profiling before it had a label, we still have a long way to go.

The unfairness that befell people like Tom Robinson, though maybe not as overtly (or maybe so, depending on who you ask), still exists today. People are judged by the color of their skin, the god they choose to worship, who they choose to love. While all those may not be mockingbirds, complete innocents, they are still enduring great injustice through intolerance and prejudice.

Let's talk about black history month for example. Many people ask, why do we need it? And, why is there no white history month.I will quote my own self from my Facebook profile to explain the whys.

Today Black History Month begins. I know some people question its importance, including some African Americans. I may not be able to express why with the right words, but I'm going to try to explain its importance and significance.

For centuries schools have taught history. However, many of the achievements and contributions made by African Americans have been omitted, so really, our history lessons were whitewashed (also the reason, no, we don't need a White History Month). Just like whites, African Americans have contributed greatly to art, science, politics and sports, among numerous other components of American culture. We should know about these contributions. We should learn about them. We should care about them.

Blacks have, and continue to, endure hardships we can't even fathom. They have overcome many obstacles and injustices and have triumphed. There are works of art, events, inventions, and progress that would never have been possible if it wasn't for the contributions of African Americans.

I think it's our responsibility as Americans to learn more about our prolific history, not the whitewashed one we were taught in school, but the one in which a diverse people made and continue to make notable and innovative achievements and contributions, allowing us to become the strongest nation in the world.

So, that's why.

Photo by Gage Skidmore 

And let's talk about the 2016 Oscars. It's really not just about black, but about diversity. Every actor and actress nominee is pretty much the whitest people you could choose. I'm not saying they don't deserve their nods. To be honest, I've not seen many movies this year (okay, I've seen one and it wasn't Oscar worthy) but many of them have actors of color that have been overlooked when others related to the movie have received nominations. Such as:

Creed: Sylvester Stallone is nominated for Best Supporting Actor, but no Best Actor nom for the talented Michael B. Jordan?

Straight Outta Compton:  White people nominated for writing, but no nod to actor Jason Mitchell, whose performance was critically acclaimed.


The Hateful Eight: Jennifer Jason Leigh is nominated for Best Supporting Actress. No nomination for Samuel Jackson.

A couple others passed over...Idris Elba for Beasts of No Nation and Will Smith for Concussion. And that's just the actors. Director of Creed, Ryan Coogler and director of Straight Outta Compton,  F. Gary Gray were also overlooked for Oscar nominations.

It's really a sad statement that 56 years after To Kill a Mockingbird, racial inequality and discrimination still exists. It's too bad, that just as Scout and Jem had to witness  the injustices in a dominantly white society, we still have to endure the ugly face of prejudice. And that this mindset, though it may be diluted from generation to generation, is still passed on. Racism is not innate, it's learned behavior. What I wouldn't give to live in a world that sees each other through the eyes of children. They don't notice color, at least not when they're very young. They see beyond the color of skin into the heart of a person.

And as I said, it's not just about color. It's about religion, sex, sexual orientation, social class...we should view each other as Mockingbirds, worthy of respect and admiration. We should embrace our differences, not judge them. Instead of knocking each other down, we should be lifting each other up.

I know society has come a long way since the era to TKAM, but it's still not good enough. We need more Finches in the world. Those who lend a voice to those who can't speak for themselves. Those who understand that people shouldn't be judged because they are different in some ways. Inside we are all flesh, blood, muscle...the things that make us all human. The things about us that are the same. 

Banned Book Week!!!!

Did you know that this week is Banned Book Week? What is Banned Book Week you ask?

It's an annual celebration of our freedom to read whatever we choose. Libraries and bookstores nationwide get involved, drawing attention to the problem of censorship by mounting displays of banned books and hosting a variety of events. Banned Books Week began in 1982 and more than 11,300 books have been challenged since. For more information on Banned Books Week, Visit the  American Library Association (ALA). According to the ALA, there were 326 challenges reported to the Office of Intellectual Freedom in 2011. The 10 most challenged titles of 2011 were:

1. ttyl; ttfn; l8r, g8r (series), by Lauren Myracle Reasons: offensive language; religious viewpoint; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
2. The Color of Earth (series), by Kim Dong Hwa
   Reasons: nudity; sex education; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
3. The Hunger Games trilogy, by Suzanne Collins
   Reasons: anti-ethnic; anti-family; insensitivity; offensive language; occult/satanic; violence
4. My Mom's Having A Baby! A Kid's Month-by-Month Guide to Pregnancy, by Dori Hillestad Butler
   Reasons: nudity; sex education; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
5. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie
   Reasons: offensive language; racism; religious viewpoint; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
6. Alice (series), by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
   Reasons: nudity; offensive language; religious viewpoint
7. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
   Reasons: insensitivity; nudity; racism; religious viewpoint; sexually explicit
8. What My Mother Doesn't Know, by Sonya Sones
   Reasons: nudity; offensive language; sexually explicit
9. Gossip Girl (series), by Cecily Von Ziegesar
   Reasons: drugs; offensive language; sexually explicit
10. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
    Reasons: offensive language; racism

 I will say this, number 10 is my favorite book ever. Racism? Um, do we need to censor that fact that racism ever took place? It's a historical fact that there were bigots in our country, and hey, guess what, come here, I have a secret, *whispers* there still are.

I'm appalled that books are still banned in this day and age, but you know what, I hope that someday I am in the company of these wonderful books, and that my book also makes the list of challenged books.

Tuesday Tips: The Colon

We're back with the assistance of Punctuation Made Simple.  Today's lesson is about the colon. 

Apparently, the colon is one of the easiest punctuations marks you can use.  It only does one thing in prose:  it introduces. It can introduce just about anything: a word, a phrase, a sentence, a quotation, or a list.

I've already given you a couple examples above; here are some more.

Megan has only one thing on her mind: publication.
Megan has only one thing on her mind: her book,  Never Eighteen. (Like how I squeeze a mention of my book in there?  If you click on it, you can pre-order it, hint, hint)
Megan has only one thing on her mind: she wants her book to be successful.
Megan has three things on her mind: publication, marketing, and sales.

The colon in these four sentences introduce various kinds of things: a word, a phrase, a sentence, and a list.  A colon gives special emphasis to whatever you’re introducing because readers must first come to a stop, and so they pay more attention to it.

If you aren’t sure whether you need a colon in a particular sentence, here is a handy test: read the sentence, and when you reach the colon, substitute the word namely; if the sentence reads through smoothly, then there’s a good chance that you do need a colon. For example, you can read any of the example sentences above with the word namely in the place of the colon:

Megan has only one thing on her mind, namely publication.

Megan has only one thing on her mind, namely her book,  Never Eighteen.
Megan has only one thing on her mind, namely she wants her book to be successful.
Megan has three things on her mind, namely publication, marketing, and sales.

This test may not work 100 percent of the time, but it is a fairly reliable indicator of whether you need a colon.

One word of caution: do not place the colon after the verb in a sentence, even when you are introducing something, because the verb itself introduces and the colon would be redundant. For example, you would not write:

My three favorite books are: To Kill a Mocking Bird, The Handmaid's Tale, and Lord of the Flies.

The colon is not necessary in the sentence above because the verb does the work of introducing the three books. You can check this sentence by using the test we just mentioned. It would seem awkward to read this sentence, “My three favorite books are namely, To Kill a Mocking Bird, The Handmaid's Tale, and Lord of the Flies .” The fact that the sentence is awkward when you read it with namely is an indication that the colon is unnecessary. Remember, the colon shows emphasis and, therefore, you want the reader to stop at the colon before preceding on to whatever it is you are introducing.

Quotes from favorite books

Just thought about this because I had posted a quote from Fahrenheit 451 on my Facebook page.

"We need not to be let alone. We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you were really bothered? About something important, about something real?"

Here are some other quotes from my favorite books.

"They're certainly entitled to think that, and they're entitled to full respect for their opinions... but before I can live with other folks I've got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience." ~Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

"We yearned for the future. How did we learn it, that talent for insatiability?” ~ Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale

"'Maybe there is a beast....maybe it's only us.'" ~ William Golding, Lord of the Flies

"What really knocks me out is a book, when you're all done reading it, you wished the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it." ~ JD Salinger, Catcher in the Rye

"My father was very sure about certain matters pertaining to the universe. To him, all good things--trout as well as eternal salvation--come by grace and grace comes by art and art does not come easy. " ~ Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It