I saw it and stopped. I had to pinch myself. I had to ask, Is this really happening?
I read somewhere that Dr. Seuss' contributions to Read Across America Day, which is normally March 2 (his birthday or the first Monday afterwards if March 2 is on a weekend), is being diminished. To an extent, that makes sense.
Dr. Seuss was not, in any sense, politically correct. He was immensely creative and concocted some terrific stories for elementary (mostly) kids to absorb. He'll be remembered perpetually for having done so, and should be.
But some of his images were, and are, offensively stereotypical of non-white folks from other lands. For decades, they had been brushed over and ignored amidst the so-called 'greater good' of getting stuff to kids to read and enjoy as fun. But they branded some people badly and with unhesitating condescension.
Six Seuss books are apparently going to be excluded from any promotion of Read Across America Day. But that's not what's all that remarkable: In this far more 'woke' age, political correctness finally caught up with Dr. Seuss. Many of his books are a terrific celebration of creativity, but some can potentially be damaging and reinforce deeply held stereotypes that we should be guiding children beyond.
Nope, though important, that's not what gave me pause. It was the fact that someone besides the National Education Association was doing the announcing of it.
That meant something really important: That RAA was out there and being absorbed and a thoroughly accepted part of our culture. That's been a journey of about a quarter-century.
Read Across America, you see, was invented by the National Education Association. Nobody else. Just us.
It was created out of a need to show people that, as a union, we were as interested in kids than we were in ourselves. The rap against teachers' unions is that they only care about themselves, that they come first and the kids second. Sometimes, that has to be true. That's why contracts are encouraged and drawn up. That's why organizing persists: Because without it, teachers and support staff get walked on and get guilt rained down on us if we don't act like we're someone's whipping posts. Organizing, and demanding a contract, is an act of both resistance and self-respect. If you don't have that, it's more difficult to get it in a classroom. The job's tough enough the way it is.
But if someone bothers to get beyond that, they'll be assured that the reason we're in the profession is that we like kids and want the best for them. Nothing about being in a union betrays that. Burned-out people teaching and bussing and cooking for them isn't the best way to achieve educational success. That's why lines must be drawn to define an educator's tasks so they can come back the next day ready to do them again with the energy it takes to do them well. Contracts do that. They guarantee a cross-current of respect.
The NEA came up with Read Across America as what is now an ironclad educational endorsement. Because who doesn't need to read something to do their job? And don't millions of people just simply love to read, love to take some time during the day and immerse themselves in a story? Needing to read in school is obvious; what we wanted to show is lots and lots of non-educators reading, too.
So we set out and did so. We nudged famous people and got TV networks and local talk-show hosts to buy in. It was hard, taxing and challenging work just to get people to set aside the stereotype they'd established of us, and we spent millions of dollars on it: Stovepipe hats (for the Cat in the Hat, which endures), magnets, pens, stickers, and of course millions of Dr. Seuss books. Members of the Executive Committee, like Yours Truly, have been carted to schools throughout the nation--North Carolina, Utah, Colorado, Texas and other Gulf States in the aftermath of hurricanes, for instance--and we read Seuss stories (I selected Horton Hears A Who, the message of which, I hope, resonated: "A person's a person, no matter how small.") to them as well as other authors.
We read them to classrooms and whole school populations. I introduced myself as Mister Mark--you may have seen that elsewhere--and acted out the story, with a squeaky voice like the Whos must have had in Whoville (I mean, they are really little people. They couldn't have sounded like James Earl Jones.). It was great fun.
And, just as importantly, it reached our own members in their classrooms, where many of them took that ball and ran with it--which is also what we were hoping would happen--to promote our non-profit brand. We had an engine we needed to start up: The members maintained it for us.
At the top of the NEA food chain, RAA was often regarded as necessary hype, not really connected to our goals and strivings. Nobody else on the Executive Committee, at least when I was there, can look me in the face and say otherwise; I'm quite sure many state affiliate presidents felt the same way. I know a number of us were convinced the whole thing would soon fade.
But every year, the stories would resonate. Every year, the NEA Board, filled with classroom teachers not on leave, would approach the growing commitment and recharge it with enthusiasm. Besides, the school visits were waiting.
But we jumped the gun of the main issue: Dr. Seuss' own prejudices and the unavoidable context of his early work. Read Across America had gained some steam and several years of operation when it was discovered that some of his political cartoons during World War II were very patriotic, but extremely (and understandably) inconsiderate to some of our enemies.
The Asian-American Caucus caught it first, early in this century, and staff went about trying to find some kind of ameliorating comments, somewhere in Seuss' memoirs or other writings, that would in some way give off a that-was-then-this-is-now attitude toward the very racist and negative stereotypes he portrayed against the Japanese in World War II. But none could be found. This problem was folded into the treatment of Japanese-Americans, which was horrendous since they were carted off to internment camps, justice for which was addressed some 43 years later with a fairly token payment of reparations. So there also was that insult, piled on and passed along.
NEA leadership addressed the issue, but what could be done outside of shutting the whole thing down? That was impossible: too much money, time and bother had already been spent, and the guilt factor toward robbing the little ones of their stovepipe hats had moved in. So we dealt with it as we usually do, as the country usually does: with alternative choices allowed by states that might be uncomfortable with a national program. Thus, the California Education Association, the center of Asian-American membership at that time, did not feature Dr. Seuss in any celebration of reading. Other states followed. Nobody insisted that it be otherwise. And so we went on. (Yup, the NEA is rife with inside intrigue. Like internal politics? Step right this way.)
As has been true elsewhere with other things that the NEA and its affiliates have initiated, that influence spread. The NEA has de-emphasized reliance on Dr. Seuss to promote reading, too. Guess what? It did nothing to limit the spread of Dr. Seuss books or interest in reading for kids.
And the other day, Dr. Seuss Enterprises, which oversees his estate, decided after consulting with a panel of experts which included educators (I do not have the names, but I'm guessing NEA members were in there somewhere; we are everywhere) that six books had harmful stereotypes and thus publication of them would no longer take place. Random House Children's Books, which controls the publishing, is respecting the decision.
That still leaves an awful lot of books that will be read by millions of kids, including the classic The Cat in the Hat. I recommend The Butter Battle Book, as anti-war a work as anything else I've ever seen. It has the rare quality of transcending age groups. The analogy is telling and unchallengeable. You'll shake your head at humankind's stupidity. It is especially cogent in today's polarized world.
(No, the Democratic Party had nothing to do with the cancellations, and neither did President Biden. Any rumors to that extent and conclusion are wrong, being spread by people who need to smear the "cancel culture" because they have nothing else they can control. Besides, those six books can now be collectors' items--wait and see.)
I concur with a letter writer to the New York Times the other day, Ray Kosarin: "Dr. Seuss is neither villain nor saint, and is not being 'cancelled.' His stewards are entitled to manage his work and impact. The artist's racial stereotypes, we thankfully understand now, were wrong--but also prevailed in his time. Because Dr. Seuss made enduring work, it endured to be scrutinized with enduring eyes. So we may celebrate Dr. Seuss' gifts and quell the damage of his failings."
And he lives on, thanks to the NEA and others who continue to see quality, however flawed, where it exists. The Whos in Whoville like it, too.
Be well. Be careful. Wear a mask. Day Two after a second vaccine shot. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.
Mister Mark
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