argument essay about ya fiction

Why Young Adult Fiction Should have warnings

“…It was all… suicide and self-mutilation, this dark, dark stuff” says Amy Freeman, a highly

concerned mother of three in the article “Darkness Too Visible” by Megan Cox Gurdon. In young

 adult

 fiction these days, extreme violence such as rape, murder, and other awful things are normal. This is concern for many parents, and to others, not so much. This is why teens should not be limited to YA fiction, but there should be an age rating or a warning of some kind for sensitive readers.

                One reason YA fiction should have age ratings is because past suffering kids might want to divert themselves from dark YA fiction to avoid getting apprehensive about frightening topics covered in these novels. For example, in the article “Darkness Too Visible” by Megan Cox Gurdon, it says that a library in Kentucky challenged a gruesome book called “Scars”, because it could cause a previous self-mutilator to harm themselves again. An age rating could help solve this problem, because a person who cut themselves before would know not to read this tempting book because they would get sensitive. Also, not everybody would have to suffer. Comparatively, another example of age ratings working for this cause would be in the previous article, it says “books focusing on pathologies help normalize them and, in the case of self-harm, may even spread their plausibility and likelihood to young people.” This shows that not only kids with previous problems, just kids in general can be affected by these scarring novels. For example, characters in book that found joy or relief in hurting themselves, might encourage kids or give them new ways to commit self-harm.

                Not only kids, but also parents should be considered in the decision of why shady YA fiction should have age ratings is because if kids want to read it, but their parents are uneasy about letting them, the parents can decide what is admissible for them to read. Also, since some parents are a little looser about what their kids read, they will have a different standard. Take relaxed author of the article “Has Young Adult Fiction Become Too Dark?” and mother, Mary Elizabeth Williams, takes her kids to the library very frequently and has yet to find a book she wouldn’t let them read. This shows a kind of parent that would ignore ratings. And then there’s the concerned Amy Freeman. A poor mother of three who couldn’t find a seemly book for her daughter. “Nothing, not a thing I could imagine giving my daughter. It was all vampires, suicide and self-mutilation, this dark, dark stuff.” She says in the article “Darkness Too Visible” by Megan Cox Gurdon. This shows a parent that would probably need an age rating on books to know what is tolerable for her kid to read. These two very different parents show two very different types of child situations as well. It could be possible, that a kid wants to read something, but the parent knows what is right for them to read and what is not. In another example from, “Darkness Too Visible” it says “’We like to have the adult perspective, but we try to target teens because that’s who’s reading it’ the book stayed on the shelves.” This is a bad idea because they are basically putting a less experienced child’s opinion first instead of an adult, who is responsible for the child in the first place. This could result in many dreadful things for the child such as self-harm or grotesque images in the child’s mind imprinted forever.

                Although many people say an age rating will not cover all the topics and reasons why parents would not let their kids read a book. They may say that an age rating is only going to determine what is appropriate for kids. This is counterfactual. Like a movie, an age rating would include why this book is challenged or rated the way it is. Parents or even kids have many different reasons why they would like a book to be banned. For example, the video “Book Under Fire” which took place in Conrow, Texas, told the story of a girl named Diana who was upset a book she had to read for school. The main reason she was upset was it degraded christians. This is an example of only someone from this religion getting upset. If someone from this religion sees a warning, they will know to ignore it because it won’t offend them. Correspondingly, like the library in Kentucky from the article “Darkness Too Visible” by Megan Cox Gurdon, banning the novel “Scars” might only benefit the people who self-harmers. And for the readers who never self-harmed, nor have ever thought of it, would only be deprived of a novel that they might have wanted to read. That wouldn’t be fair. An age rating would help fix this problem because someone who used to self-harm and thinks that this book might cause them to relapse, wouldn’t read this book based on the rating. Someone who know that it won’t affect them negatively, would ignore the rating.

                Overall, a warning of any kind would help people who have a problem with some books and people who don’t. It will help people that do, because they will know what and what not to read. Age ratings will make it fair for everyone. Taking a book away from a small group that has a problem with it isn’t fair to the people who wanted to read it. YA fiction can teach lessons, and taking those lessons away from the people who want read these books, won’t get to connect to characters, and learn about life. Yes, people think they are too young and should save their innocence, but they need to find out what it’s like in a book, before it happens to them in person so they can prepare for life. And if they feel that they  don’t want to read this book, then they don’t have to based on the rating. But it is not fair to take it away from everybody else by just strait up banning it.