Guess What? Parenting is Hard

The latest storm in the YA world is a Wall Street Journal article decrying the so-called trend toward dark and disturbing stories. You can read it here. And better yet, read the response of Cheryl Rainfield; she's the author of one of the books slammed by the article.

Many YA writers and readers have responded to the original WSJ article with eloquent and beautiful blog and Twitter posts about how YA books changed their lives. (Search for these on Twitter with the hashtag #YAsaves). I wanted to respond from a slightly different perspective. And from this perspective, I have to admit I read the WSJ article with a conflicted heart. Now, don't get me wrong, it's a terrible article, written by someone who clearly doesn't read young adult fiction. The author doesn't make any attempt to distinguish between books full of gratuitous abuse, sex, and violence, and books with abuse, sex and violence that's necessary and important to telling a story.

The problem is that I'm a parent, with an eight year-old daughter and a ten year-old son. And the truth is, I worry about my kids delving into the world of what is sometimes dark, violent, and sexual young adult literature. I worry about the bookshelves that are full of a mix of important books and awful books; I wonder how to tell apart the great, important, difficult books, and the terrible, meaningless, damaging books. I can imagine the panicked feeling of that mom at the B&N, struggling to find a book for her impressionable 11 year-old daughter.

But guess what? My whole world as a parent is like this. Difficult. Conflicted. Scary. I have a problem with gratuitous violence. I don't let my son play first-person shooter video games. I don't let my kids watch R-rated movies. I worry about them being exposed to news about war, rape, violence, and killing. Hell, I worry about them getting strep throat. I worry because I'm a parent, and I love my kids, and I want to protect them. I want to shelter them and keep them innocent as long as I can, and then slowly, when they're ready, introduce them to the real world. I want to teach them about evil on my terms, not on the terms dictated by a world that I believe glorifies violence, particularly violence against women.

When my son was eight, he wanted to read the fourth book in the Harry Potter series. I hemmed and hawed. I worried about the violence. I didn't think he was ready, but I didn't want to censor. Luckily, I hemmed and hawed long enough for him to lose interest. He didn't pick it up again for a year or so. When he did, I was able to let him read with a much lighter heart.

My daughter is an amazing, happy person who loves her body, feels strong and powerful, and wouldn't dream of letting a boy hurt her physically or emotionally. A few days ago, she heard a story I was listening to on NPR about women in Saudi Arabia not being allowed to drive. She was astonished. Why would people think women shouldn't drive? She doesn't have a base from which to understand sexism. I had to explain to her that people throughout history, in most cultures, have treated women differently. But why? she asked. I found her utter confusion comforting, even while I struggled to explain why people treat women as less competent, capable, and intelligent as men.

My children are incredibly lucky to have a stable home, parents who love them, enough money for food and rent, and a great school. But the world they live in isn't all rainbows and ponies. The world is filled with sickness, violence, abuse, depression, and war. My kids will have to learn about it (though I will do my best to ensure they don't learn it first-hand). My daughter will learn about sexism, violence against women, and body image disorders. My son will start playing violent video games. Someday, God help me, my children will want to have sex.

(I'm going to start panicking about that now, BTW.)

And that brings me back to those violent, sexual, dark young adult books. Someday, my kids might choose to read them. They might not. As a parent, I think my job will be to figure out when they are ready to read them, and then walk through the experience with them, hand in hand. Banning books is not the answer. Parenting is. And it's hard. I'm going to have to read a lot of books to know what they're reading. I'm going to have to talk to librarians and book bloggers and booksellers to have an idea of what I think they might enjoy and be ready to read. I might not be able to walk into Barnes and Noble and instantly find what I want for my eleven year-old daughter on the "new paranormal romance" shelf.

Someday, I'm going to have to let go of the reins and know that I don't have control. They're going to choose their own books, and I'm going to have to hope they trust me enough to ask questions about what they're reading.

I'm going to be conflicted. I'm going to be incredibly glad that books like Scars are there for kids who need them, even while I'm terrified by the thought of my kids stumbling across them before they're ready. I'm going to be worried about my daughter having sex before she's ready. I'm going to worry that she'll read books that make it sound like every sixteen year-old girl has sex. I'm going to worry that she'll read books that make it sound like if a boy loves you a lot, he's going to want to hurt you, bite you in the neck, and kill you. I'm going to worry a lot.

That's what I do. I'm a parent. And in parenting, like in life, there are no easy answers. You love them, teach them as best you can, and then trust them to make their own decisions. And you wake up every day grateful to be living in a world where they get to make those decisions.