Roald Dahl's work edited to cater to identity politics

Post Reply New Topic

Every time I point out when a piece of media is changed or released to suit a social justice warrior's agenda, you say it's not a big deal and that I should lay back and take it. After seeing how artificial it's all become, I ain't taking s**t!

What I say, is that it's not a a big deal because it really isn't.

You've chosen to assume your favourite strawmen is involved but never actually cite anything to support that assumption and then you rely on outrage rather than making any serious point about how this might actually be a problem.

You're emotionally distraught over changes to a children's book. I don't know how you define p****, but that's well within the definition for most people who use that insult.

I just stumbled upon an interesting article claiming that it's about corporate safetyism rather than social justice.

Safetyism, another stupid term.

Still though, without the nastiness, it's not Dahl's writing.

Heard the story on NPR. The lady spokesperson for the publisher was kinda convincing...saying things like "Dahl's words arent sacred". Sure...its not the Holy Koran, nor the Bible.

But still...

Whats wrong with a character "turning white with fear"? Even Black folks can get pale with fear.

And he had a distinctive voice...K sounds combined in sentences...in a gnarly way...the kids love... that gets washed out.

Seems a bit much to me.

Heard the story on NPR. The lady spokesperson for the publisher was kinda convincing...saying things like "Dahl's words arent sacred". Sure...its not the Holy Koran, nor the Bible.

But still...

Whats wrong with a character "turning white with fear"? Even dark skinned folks can get relatively pale with fear.

And he had a distinctive voice...K sounds combined in sentences...in a gnarly way...the kids love... that gets washed out.

Seems a bit much to me.

I must admit there are some peculiar changes that have been made, but censorship of children's books and cartoons often includes strange decisions based on the network or publishing company's personal judgement and /or the sensitivity reader group(s).

However, I will say that children who do wish to read less censored material will always find a way. I was said child.

A lot of parents these days can't be satisfied with what their children watch. The preschool TV show Topsy and Tim is hated by so many parents because the twins are "too well-behaved", and they were whining on Mumsnet that it should include more yelling, discipline, conflicts, and more imperfections. So basically it should be like EastEnders or the Jeremy Kyle show. If that happened then the same parents would be on Mumsnet whining that the show is too traumatic for their children to watch.

Maybe they should just lock the children away wrapped in cotton wool and never exposed to anything until they're teenagers. Then see how they grow and learn the differences between make-believe and real life.

Reminds me of a teacher I had in highschool. Had him for public speaking class. This was back around 1970 when the national rating system for movies was implemented (G, GP, M, X). He told us about how back in the Fifties the Catholic Church had it own decency rating. He was a good Catholic boy who went to Catholic school. But one weekend he, and his teen buddies went to see ...one of the "forbidden movies".

They were all deeply disappointed. "Is THAT all it is????". They expected something risque' and sexually stimulating. But it was just a boring ass unsexy foreign film they didnt even understand. They didnt even see why it was forbidden. Years later he thought about it and realized that the movie made fun of the Catholic Church, and THAT was the issue.

So if there are "kids" out there who seek out the "unexpurgated" versions of Dahl stories they will probably be similarly dissappointed!

I guess that my point is that sometimes "forbidden fruit" is disappointing.

I never had to try all that hard to find content that wasn't suitable for my age group. For instance, in the school library, they had accidentally purchased the wrong version of fairytales. So I used to sit there and quietly read Cinderella; the adults around me were most likely completely unaware that I was reading an English version that stayed accurate to the original tale. Gore and all. I was aware that this would be deemed inappropriate for me, so I was always careful in regards to making sure no one was looking when I had the book open to certain pages. I always flipped back to an illustration of the dresses if someone got too close, just in case. My school was a bit careless at times, which I used to my advantage.

Frankly I am surprised that Jacqueline Wilson's books aren't censored more than they are... or certainly at least as they were. I remember reading stories that were pretty explicit in covering subjects such as domestic abuse, alcoholism and suicide. Perhaps said books are deemed to have an older target demographic than Dahl's work, so the censors are more lenient. (Then again, I remember the ending to The Witches, which was quite dark for a children's book. I wonder if such areas have been dialled back at all or if it's just minor language changes).Wilson definitely seemed to get away with quite a lot in her stories as well.

If the publishing team did have an older audience in mind, I didn't pay any attention to this information. I read Wilson's work at the same sort of time as I read a significant amount of Dahl's books.

My parents used to change the words to Beatrix Potter's books when reading me a bedtime story. I was quite taken aback when I sat down years later and actually read them.

Sorry OP, I hope you'll allow my slight verge into being somewhat off topic.

I personally disagree with the editing of an accomplished Writer such as Roald Dahl. I personally don't care for watering down words, for the sake of catering to people's sensitive feelings. But I have no disrespect towards anyone who feels different. Just my two cents. I could be wrong.

But they've been changed as well so I guess you're allowed to change anything.

Why blame this on social justice warriors?

It's not like social justice warriors have a special right that allows them to change any book they want. Someone else changed those books.

I did mention later that I found an article blaming it on Corporate Safetyism.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-64759118

Another case of censorship to cater to identity politics

So the publisher is backing off. Good.