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Why Should Cat's Crad Not Be Banned

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Book banning limits, restricts, and denies access to any literary work or book. Literary works become removed from public access because they offend people in some way or another. Books containing “sexual abuse, discrimination, or similar topics,” become challenged because they deal with realities society commonly ignores (Durand 92). Kurt Vonnegut's fictional novel, Cat’s Cradle, became censored by the Strongsville City School District on June 19, 1972, simply because its ideas about humanity’s stupidity appeared to be “garbage” and “completely sick” in the eyes of professors (Pal 46). While it may offend many groups of people with its critical viewpoint of humanity, Cat’s Cradle and books alike should not be censored because it goes against …show more content…

Jonah, the curious protagonist in Vonnegut's novel, witnesses a “winded, defeated-looking fat woman” covered in disgusting clothes who had turned to look at Dr, Breed, a friend of his. He points out that this woman “hated people who think too much,” and sarcastically states how this grimy woman appeared to be an “appropriate representative” for all society (Vonnegut 33). Vonnegut uses this comparison to convey his pessimistic views on society, specifically how people’s laziness allows them to continuously believe in lies by looking down upon those who begin to think of other truths. Cat’s Cradle also introduces a new controversial religion called Bokonon. This new religion attempts to influence the reader to follow the Books of Bokonon by stating that “[all] useful religion is founded on lies” in which following them will eventually lead one to unhappiness (Vonnegut 6). However, this religion becomes a logical fallacy when the “true things” in which one should believe in to be happy, are later specified as “shameless lies” that seem to trick one into being happy (Vonnegut 5). Vonnegut uses Bokonon to prove the illogical basis for humanity's belief in war when Bokonon, the creator of Bokononism, demands that the people of San Lorenzo should commit suicide when the world ends simply because “God was [already] trying to kill them” and he thought that suicide would be a quicker alternative (273). The mass suicide demonstrates the ultimate end to those who believe in such lies, such as how humanity believes that with each battle or war they will finally reach an era of peace. However, Vonnegut believes humanity’s belief in such an easy lie has become a logical fallacy that will end up destroying their world far before the era ever arises. People’s tendency to act as fat and defeated entities that express their differences with a

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With student loan debt on the rise across the United States of America, measures must be taken to address the issue of millions of Americans facing tens of thousands of dollars in debt immediately after finishing college. According to Robert Applebaum, a man that began a petition for the United States federal government to offer a one time deal of forgiving all student loans, to forgive these loans is a necessity and may prove to boost the economy. In Kayla Webley’s “Is Forgiving Student Loan Debt a Good Idea?”, the journalist and correspondent for Times magazine takes a long hard look at Applebaum’s proposal and just how forgiving the student loan debt is likely to play out. Throughout her article, Webley dissects the argument for forgiving

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Throughout Slaughterhouse Five, Kurt Vonnegut intertwines reality and fiction to provide the reader with an anti-war book in a more abstract form. To achieve this abstraction, Kurt Vonnegut utilizes descriptive images, character archetypes, and various themes within the novel. By doing so, he created a unique form of literature that causes the reader to separate reality from falsehood in both their world, and in the world within Vonnegut’s mind. Vonnegut focuses a lot on the characters and their actions in “Slaughterhouse Five.”

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In the article,”How Banning Books Marginalizes Children” the author Paul Ringel brings attention to an event called, “Banned Books Week” which has been occurring every year since 1982. This week gives prominence to “literary works frequently challenged by parents, schools and libraries” (Ringel 1) due to the context that relates to violence, religion, offensive language or the mentioning of drug use. 52 percent of the books that are obliged to be challenged in Ringel's opinion includes material that delivers “diverse content--which explores issues such as race, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, mental illness, and disability” (1). Ringel believes books that create controversy and forces the reader to explore should not be banned, because it “end(s) up marginalizing the lives and experiences of many young readers, rather than protecting them” (2) from diverse content.

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Is honesty the best policy even if the truth disturbs many people? Kurt Vonnegut bluntly relays his opinion on the war between science and religion and other controversial topics concerning life though his novel, Cat’s Cradle. Consequently, it was banned by the Ohio School Board in 1972 “without stating an official reason”(“Taboo Titles”). The debunking of the validity of religious and scientific beliefs, and the harsh truth embedded within his work has earned Vonnegut a spot on the controversial “Banned Books” list.

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Kyndal Watson Ms. Reichert English 206 May 22, 2024 Reader response theory Should schools have the ability to censor books that do not correlate with their own opinions? In 1973, Charles McCarthy, head of the school board at Drake High School in North Dakota, burned Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Slaughterhouse-Five. McCarthy was not the only one though, due to its use of language, depictions of sexual acts, lack of patriotism, and mentions of homosexuality, the novel has undergone at least eighteen banning attempts in public school systems and libraries in the United States. Having said this, it seems Vonnegut’s novel was also not the only book burned. In his letter he states “I am among those American Writers whose books have been destroyed in the now famous furnace of your school.”

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This is because most religions have some sort of holy text. Judaism has the Torah, Christianity has the Bible, Islam has the Koran, and Hinduism has the Shrutí. The Books of Bokonon are just one way in which Vonnegut satirizes religion and religious themes. Science takes the opposite opinion. One of the men who helped create the atomic bomb tells us, “The more truth we have to work with, the richer we become,” (Vonnegut 41).

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People are influenced by the events that surround them. Individuals transform into a product of their environment and experiences of the time. The literature and art often reflects the time period in which it is written in, and Vonnegut’s novel is no exception. The novel takes place during World War II, but is written during the time of the Vietnam War. With the Vietnam War, came a lot of anti-war propaganda.

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Book banning is not as common as it is made out to be in the U.S., but it does put a restriction the constitution’s first amendment. To ban a book, in the U.S., from a public or school libraries, for offensive content, a challenge must be made against the book. A challenge can be made by anyone but of the challenges made between “1990 and 2000, there were 6,364 challenges reported... sixty percent were reported by parents, fifteen percent by patrons and nine percent by administrators” (Schools and censorship: Banned Books). Most of these challenges sent to the American Library Association do not get accepted and officially ban the book.

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The Cat’s Cradle: A Symbol of False Perception The Cold War era was characterized by a vast amount of technological advancement, yet this exciting period of curiosity was also represented by weapons of mass destruction, such as the atomic bomb. Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Cat’s Cradle features the life of Dr. Hoenikker, the father of the atomic bomb, and how he and his children handle his invention called “ice-nine”, a form of water that crystallizes everything upon touch. Consequently, “ice-nine” eventually leads to mass destruction of life on Earth, and this undermines the blind faith that science was purely beneficial. Throughout Cat’s Cradle, Vonnegut illustrates the stupidity and gullibility of the human condition via the satirical setting

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Trout uses science fiction and its different elements such as cognitive estrangement and structural fabulation in order to build a metaphor that guides the reader into thinking about an aspect of society that the author wants to criticize. This communicative piece intends to portray social criticism in the way Vonnegut does it, but taken to our reality and analyzing aspects we want to condemn. We opened the book on chapter nine and decided to write our own new plot as if Billy Pilgrim was the one reading it. We wrote the text and inserted it as part of the chapter in order to adhere it to the rest of society’s criticism seen in the book in the very best Vonnegut style. In order to interpret Vonnegut’s intentions and purpose of social criticism throughout Slaughterhouse Five, specially in chapter nine, it´s necessary to understand science fiction and its elements.

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The debate over the banning and challenging of books- a process in which a person or group attempts to limit or block access to certain books- has long rocked the country. These books are generally banned or challenged for including content parents find objectionable for the children to be influenced by. The most common causes for banning books in the United States include “children questioning authority, profanity,” and “characters speaking in non-standard English,” among other reasons (Winkler 49). The novel Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers has been banned and challenged throughout the country, including a ban in Arlington, Texas on charges that its profanity and violence were supposedly “too intense for Junior High readers” (“Censorship

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However, he reminds them that he is a real person too, and their actions truly hurt him. He does this by utilizing vibrant language and effective sentence structure. Kurt Vonnegut starts by stating that he and his publisher “have done absolutely nothing to exploit the disgusting news from Drake” (Vonnegut 4). The use of “disgusting” is very noteworthy, as it is a very strong word that conveys how utterly upset and repulsed Vonnegut was hearing news of the book burning. He goes on to say, “We are angered and sickened and saddened” (Vonnegut 4).

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Kurt Vonnegut mainly focuses his vision actually disordered cycle of life and death to which all human beings are inseparably bound. Kurt Vonnegut representing the purely existential horrors facing man and he is also compelled by his desire to confront all the cruel facts of human survival to show how man gives to his own depression through blindness and stupidity. The invention of technology is also a cruel thing in the world. Even Kurt Vonnegut used the technique to alter the world and that also has the possibility to become reality.

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Vonnegut uses oxymoron and the repetition of allusion to further idea, that to an extent, the truth, being as practical as it might, does not give humankind enough satisfaction, and it is actually in those deceptions one is given the vaguest illusion of value and

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The First Amendment states, “…abridging the freedom of speech or of press…” When a book is banned, it is denying the freedom of an author to express him or herself and is denying a person the right to access that book. Although banning books is the freedom to express an opinion against the book, it would hurt the author that wrote the book and make them feel inferior. Taken from I Am Very Real written by Kurt Vonnegut, “You have insulted me, and I am a good citizen, and I am very real.” In this, Kurt Vonnegut is showing how when one of his books was banned, how offended and hurt he was by that one action. The people banning the

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