While I'm at ECU I'm taking two classes, three is the maximum and I wanted to take more than one so I had to find two that would transfer over from ECU to APP. Since I'm a creative writing minor, I figured I'd just try and take two english classes while here.
One of my classes is Major British Writers (bore me to death) and the other one is Interpreting Literature. When we first registered for classes I was in the Interpreting Literature class without Lindy but after some convincing and schedule rearranging, she ended up switching into it with me.
After the third day of it, I felt pretty bad for making her sign up for it.
In the class we are reading a variety of books but the first one we were assigned is called Brief Interviews with Hideous Men and it's a compilation of short stories by one author.
(by the way the author committed suicide, this post doesn't make that too surprising)
We were told to pick 5 stories we were interested in reading as a class from the book and we were to read those over night for our homework assignment.
We'll the "Hideous" in the title ended up being a gross understatement. This book was DISGUSTING.
Never in my life have I felt more grossed out by a piece of writing. One of the short stories we were assigned to read was about a Dad that sexually exposes himself to his child and denies it, one was about a Mom that loathes herself and her kid, one was about a 13 year old boy going through puberty and there were other lovely stories. But the worst was one called Adult World. Take a guess at what is was about...
Well, let me just tell you, it was about a young wife going to a sex store called Adult World because she felt inadequate to her husband. Yep, we had to read that. Every other word was grind or sex or any other disgusting word you can imagine. Seriously like X-rated, pornography material. I felt nauseous after I read it. I couldn't even finish it.
And not only did we read it, he also made us discuss it as a class.
He said that we all have had a sexual experience like the one in the story.
Um, False.
Like when we saw our parents naked for the first time.
Um, what the heck? That has never happened to me and I'm crossing my fingers it never will.
I was appalled. APPALLED. And so fired up about it!!
Luckily every other person in the class was too, and that is saying something! Even the guys thought it was disgusting and weird and way too graphic.
He asked us what we thought was wrong with it and I (as most people know I am not afraid to speak my mind) told him that I didn't think reading this was fair.
If I was a teacher and assigned a book that was about Christianity and Jesus and the things that I value there would be a huge uproar about it!
Separation of church and state,
forcing ideas on people,
everyone should have their own opinion
religion shouldn't be involved in school etc etc.
People would be livid that a book like that was assigned.
And yet it is okay to assign a book that is pretty much the script to a disgusting porno because it's "part of our world" and "everyone has had an experience where they've had to embrace sexuality".
This is the kind of thing that
a. makes me want to go to a Christian college so I don't have to read trash like this
b. makes me sad for our world.
Is this really the stuff that people fill their minds with? Really? That is just awful.
Luckily we're done with the book now but I'm still appalled by it. I'm going to pray for the mind of my teacher who believes the stuff in this book is normal and pray for anyone who has to read it. I'm also gonna pray for colleges who are so wrapped up in this worldliness.
Anyway, I just thought I'd share.
But if this ever happens to you, just stand up for it, because if we're reading this now who knows what our kids will be reading years down the road.
