[CALIBK12] Collection Development and GN After School Nightmare

[Blanche Woolls]

Once upon a time when my son was probably 11, he came home and said he had 
been at his friend's house looking at Playboy in the closet. My response 
was that the closet seemed like a pretty dark place and he might see them 
better if he picked them up from the magazine rack at our house.

He came home the next day and said, "Dale and Greg told their mother they 
were reading Playboy in Ronny Long's closet."

I said, "Well, you told me." and he said, "Yes, but she got mad."

Getting angry sometimes makes the situation even more appealing our 
children. And then there are the other distractions:

Because I wanted a mindless afternoon, I made the mistake of going to see 
"House Bunny." This was mindless, dumb, borderline pornography in the eyes 
of some. It featured a sorority house with one pregnant, unmarried 
member in need of a house mother. What they got was a displaced Playboy 
Bunny who wore almost no clothing for the entire show.

Who was in the theater? Our combined ages (Don and I are senior citizens) 
would total almost as high than the combined ages of the 20 or so children 
watching this worthless piece of fluff.

No, we don't need to fill our shelves with junk, but we're not saving our 
students from House Bunny or what they see nightly on their television 
sets by putting only what might be termed "safe" books on our school 
library shelves.

It might be wise to think about a book or graphic novel that, by its very 
chance to be slightly risque, might be so appealing that a student would 
read it rather than waste all that money on a theater ticket or spend the 
evening watching all the CSI shows (pretty gruesome), Criminal Minds 
(very gruesome), and even the Law and Orders with their varying degrees 
of blood.

Blanche