As all this happened, I was just reading about how Aborigine children are raised, there are certain practices that go throughout what’s now called First World cultures, used to be called Indians, before that primitive, sometimes First Nations. One thing they do is allow their children to roam very freely, and have small children of say seven watching even smaller children of four. They believe that exposing them to high risk growing up is good for them.
If parents did that in our culture it would be considered child neglect, endangerment, even child abuse. You could go to jail. We wouldn’t expect Aborigines, however, to follow our dictates, to see the world through our eyes. No one would suggest arresting them for their child rearing practices. They are following the dictates of their own ways, beliefs.
That’s kind of how the Suess thing hits me. The company that owns the Dr. Seuss books is discontinuing six of his books, citing racist things in the books that are hurtful. There are Chinese people with slanted eyes holding chopsticks, Africans with a silly, primitive look. Cats that are said to be taken from black minstrel images.
