Anne Frank’s diary has been removed from the shelves of a school district in Fort Worth, Texas, at the behest of conservative parents and members of the Keller School District school board.
Why has the diary been banned? The complaint submitted about it just said that it “shouldn’t be read without parental supervision.” The parents who objected to the book being kept in the schools’ libraries and classrooms didn’t even show up to the meeting where it was discussed.
“It’s disgusting. It’s devastating. It’s legitimate book banning, there’s no way around it,” Laney Hawes, a parent of four children in the Keller district, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “I feel bad for the teachers and the librarians.”
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16 Responses
The book has some inappropriate part. As a frum parent, I did not want my daughter to read it. I had to find a version with the inappropriate part removed. Was that what this is about?
In her diary, Anne Frank discusses explicitly her private parts. Would you want your child reading that?
My parents didnt let me read it as a kid. They objected to the innapropriate content.
Never read the book, was never assigned reading in public school. Wrong minority group. I can quote you other books though about those since I’ve had to read them so many times.
I agree with the earlier commenters. Anne Frank was a teenager with no real Jewish background and never experienced or learned the concepts of Jewish morals, modesty, and so on. She talks about things just like any non-Jewish teenager would, and thus mentions topics that most of us would not want our children exposed to. That sentiment holds true also for non-Jews who nonetheless practice religious / conservative morals and have an understanding of what is and isn’t appropriate. As such, saying the diary should require parental supervision is pretty understandable.
In truth, Anne Frank’s diary is really not so much of a Holocaust memoir as that of a teenager who grows up under persecution. It’s precisely that lack of real Jewish context that made the diary so popular all over the world. Had it been the story of a Frum boy or girl struggling to keep their spirits and Yiddishkeit alive while in hiding, it would never have reached the status this diary achieved.
Pre 1993 (about) the dairy of Anna Frank was a sanitized version without objectional parts. They were taken out of censorship then. They should just go back to the original version
You guys are disgusting. This is not just a book of “a teen under persecution”, it is a Jewish girl in hiding because she was Jewish and it certainly is about the Holocaust. This is the problem with the frum mindset, “she wasnt religious so she doesnt count and we are better”. Oh ya? How about all the parts of the journal where she writes how much she believes in Hashem and that G-D is in control of what was going on and will also protect and eventually save the Jews? Or the fact that she said the Jewish people will always be around because G-D chose us. You focus on one entry that wasnt meant to be public (aside for the fact that many edited versions of the journal are easily obtainable) instead of focusing on most of the journal where a girl who didnt grow up religious, but had the same if not more of a trust in Hashem than most of those who did grow up frum, and during the Holocaust no less! How many of you frumsters think you could have had such bitachon is such circumstances! One entry she wrote for herself which is probably less informative than what they teach elementary and High School kids in that subject or what they can learn by themselves and suddenly this piece of history by a girl ahead of her time and more mature than most 15 year olds is something you criticize? She even edited a lot of the journal and went back to entries and said that many things she wrote like arguments with Mom or other were momentary feelings which she grew out of. Too bad she never got a chance to live her life. Anne Frank was an angel that we got to know just a little through her Journal. Throughout her Journal she is constantly praying to G-D and praying for her friends especially Hannah who was her best friend and actually survived. Their are videos of Hannah telling her story, her friendship with young Anne, and the last she ever spoke to Anne in the camp before she died. Here are a few examples of not only her belief, but TRUST in Hashem no matter the outcome. I guess she was special enough to Hashem to let her fulfill her wish of living on after death through her works. And all you can focus on is ONE entry by a naive 14 year old? Kids in schools today and on their own learn much more than a simple description of human anatomy. All you Tzaddikim frumsters who are above all of us, instead of always looking for negative, learn from a girl who didnt grow up religous, and in the middle of a Holocaust had full Bitachon and Trust in Hashem!
Passages from Anne’s diary;
“The best remedy for those who are frightened, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be alone with the sky, nature and God. For only then can you feel that everything is as it should be and that God wants people to be happy amid nature’s beauty and simplicity”
“Who has inflicted this upon us? Who has set us apart from the rest? Who has put us through such suffering? It’s God who has made us the way we are, but it’s also God who will lift us up again. In the eyes of the world, we’re doomed, but if, after all this suffering, there are still Jews left, the Jewish people will be held up as an example. Who knows, maybe our religion will teach the world and all the people in it about goodness, that’s the reason, the only reason, we have to suffer.”
“The people in hiding did not sleep a wink for the rest of the night. They had come very close to being discovered! Their biggest fear was that the police would come back again, but fortunately, that didn’t happen. ‘God truly protected us”
“When I looked outside right into the depth of Nature and God, then I was happy, really happy.”
“Who has inflicted this upon us? Who has made us Jews different from all other people? Who has allowed us to suffer so terribly up till now? It is God that has made us as we are, but it will be God, too, who will raise us up again. If we bear all this suffering and if there are still Jews left, when it is over, then Jews, instead of being doomed, will be held up as an example. Who knows, it might even be our religion from which the world and all peoples learn good, and for that reason and that reason alone do we have to suffer now. We can never become just Netherlanders, or just English, or representatives of any country for that matter; we will always remain Jews, but we want to, too.”
“I’ve found that there is always some beauty left-in nature, sunshine, freedom, in yourself; these can all help you. Look at these things, then you find yourself again, and God, and then you regain your balance. And whoever is happy will make others happy too. He who has courage and faith will never perish in misery!”
I want to go on living even after my death! And therefore I am grateful to God for giving me this gift, this possibility of developing myself and of writing, of expressing all that is in me. I can shake off everything if I write; my sorrows disappear, my courage is reborn.” “
Alex Chaimowitz “It’s precisely that lack of real Jewish context that made the diary so popular all over the world. Had it been the story of a Frum boy or girl struggling to keep their spirits and Yiddishkeit alive while in hiding, it would never have reached the status this diary achieved.”
-what are you talking about?! The whole book she is davening to Hashem for her friends and family and constantly praised Hashem regardless of what the outcome will be. The whole Journal is full of keeping her Yiddishkeit alive and Yiddishkeit in general and she didnt even grow up religious which makes it even more meaningful! She even wrote how she went downstairs to the warehouse at night and was so afraid but thought about G-D and she immediately felt so much safer that nothing bad can happen to her.
I dont see what the issue is with getting an edited version of the book to read for class instead of you guys supporting a ban on it?
Even Torah, kids are taught kid versions of it, would you support a ban on Torah as well so that your kids arent exposed?
I just found out (from other outlets) that there were 40 other books that were removed from the library and school, not just this one. So making the article sound like this book was targeted is misleading.
I never read the book and I don’t honor her at all ___the secular world has a museum for her and let them have her and her gentiles…we have lost more precious and god fearing souls than this marauder….I say we cancel culture Ann Frank….as well as many other ridiculous plaques of evil
There should be some way this book could be taught in the secular schools. It makes the Holocaust approachable for teenagers of diverse backgrounds, such as using smerel’s suggestion. I am far more worried about books that link the Holocaust to all sorts of leftist and alternative lifestyles. For frum Jewish families, there are much better ways to learn about the Holocaust than reading Anne Frank. Read about the frum Jews who observed Jewish practices while in the camps. Or the efforts of Orthodox rabbis to save the Jews, while Stephen Wise was anything but wise.
What a mess of an article.
The headline says the book was “banned”. Then we find out that no, it has not been banned at all, but it was “removed from the shelves of a school district”. Since when does a school district have shelves? School districts have schools, and schools have libraries, and libraries have shelves, from which books can be removed. School districts don’t have shelves.
It takes some outside searching to find out what has really happened. The previous school board of that district was very dismissive of parents’ complaints about books in school libraries, including some very inappropriate ones. Parents finally got disgusted with the situation and elected a new board, which will take complaints more seriously. So the first thing the new board did was decide to go through all the old complaints that the previous board dismissed, and decide in each case whether the complaint was justified or not.
Since that will take some time, and in the meantime they don’t want possibly inappropriate books falling into children’s hands, they decided to remove all books that were complained of, and then as they examine each complaint, if they decide it’s not justified they’ll put that book back in the libraries. That seems completely reasonable to me.
In this case the complaint was specifically about a new graphic version of Anne Frank’s Diary. So it’s been removed, and in due course the board will discuss it and decide whether to put it back, and if so whether to do so in all the libraries, including those in elementary and middle schools, or only those in high schools.
Agreed as to inappropriate for young frum children. But the real question is if the library also had other ‘coming of age’ books that the parents did NOT complain about. You don’t like the book in part because it does not reflect YOUR Jewish values. But public schools (whether right or wrong) use it to teach tolerance to Jews. If there were other objectionable books that bypassed scrutiny it could be that we’re seeing the flip side of the conservative movement and how it could be used to steer Americans away from anti-semetism. Book-banning is sensitive stuff.
Sara Rivka, please don’t sound like a Jew-hater. Don’t turn this into a HATE SITE. To call any Jewish neshama a plague of evil is absurd. If you don’t like that teens don’t know about yiddishkeit as much as you do, how about daavening for them, for starters. Not sure why you think she is a marauder, did she attack anyone? Thoughtless. Have you considered that your error is worse than anything she’s ever done or could be responsible for? People need to be banned for that kind of speech on a Jewish website.
Sara Rifka, Anne Frank is a plaque of evil? Wow i wrote responses showing how must trust she had in G-D with all the passages and my comments dont get posted. You call her a gentile? I wish you would have been in her place I;m sure someone like you wouldnt even have an ounce of her faith in Hashem and she didnt even grow up “frum”. This is why people are turned off by fanatics like you who belittle other Jews who didnt grow up in the way you believe is right. I would rather know Jews like Anne Frank who cared about her people and davened to Hashem to protect and lift up the Jewish nation as in the past than to know fanatics like you who call these Jews gentiles and plaques of evil. A beautiful young girl who had wanted to have a life and was murdered on Kiddush Hashem gets this type of feedback from her own people?! She was a teen! Who are you to judge!
SaraRifka”I never read the book and I don’t honor her at all”
-you never even read her book you have no right to even voice your opinion! You dont honor her at all? She doesnt need your honor. You probably dont even honor yourself. A Young Jewish girl who was murdered on Kiddush Hashem and for most of her book showed her trust in Hashem and you think you are superior to her? Your frumkeit has a lot of work to do.