Crank by Ellen Hopkins
Have you ever read any books written by Ellen Hopkins. Well you should, one of her books I enjoy reading by her is called Crank. Crank is a very difficult to explain just in general its really hard to understand and read. It can really confuse someone like a eight year old. It also has some very inappropriate language and some very descriptive scenes that happen in the book. Even though some people who read this book might think I am crazy, but I don't think this book should get banned. Some might same that it should cause of its inappropriate context and descriptions of sexual actions.
In the book Crank by Ellen Hopkins, the main character Kristina does a lot of drugs and interacts sexually with lots of men. All this never happened when she lived with her mother. After she went to live with her dad all these things started to happen to Kristina. Her starting to do drugs. For example on pages 86-91 they all show her doing some type of drug with this boy she met when she went to go to live with her dad. On page 87, "Make you want to fly all night ", it also said on page 90 "powdered demons bite.'' Those two quotes from the book show Kristina is doing some sort of drug with this boy. This probably wouldn't never happen if her dad would care about his own daughter and worry about her. Kristina is probably influenced by her dad cause he always comes home high and says really rude things to his daughter. The things that Kristina does can give an example t kids, that you shouldn't do drugs cause her are your outcomes. If you do drugs your outcomes will not turn out to be great and that can hurt your life. So the reader can either take the example and learn from it or be influenced by it.
Later on in the book after Kristina stop using drugs as much, she started to interact sexually with other men. She first started with Adam, that she met when she moved in with her dad. Then later on in the book she started to do it with different men. Let me start with Adam, when she was with Adam she would let him in charge of her. He told her when to do inappropriate things. "Let me eat you up" was on page 96, if I were Kristina I would have smacked him across his face. How does she feel when he says sexually thins to her. Kristina really just doesn't care about herself if she's letting men touch her and saying sexually things to her. On page 168 Adam says, "Put it right there.", now what is that suppose to mean. How come Kristina 's dad doesn't know about this, he is the one she is getting influenced by. On page 104 her dad said, "I shouldn't be tootin'. My boss almost caught me last time. Think I could convince her to try a line? I'd love to get her in bed." That's a very negative role model. What sixteen year old wouldn't follow her dads footsteps. After Kristina slept with Adam she got raped and when she had sex with this other boy, he raped her to. Now readers can understand that you shouldn't be having sex at that age.
By now you probably already disagreeing with me that the book shouldn't get banned.
You probably think that it should get banned because, Cranks main topics are sex and drugs. Kids are going to learn about this sooner or later, I think that they should know the outcomes of each little thing they do bad or good. In an article called Texas: If You Can't Ban Books, Ban Authors by Phil Bildner states that, "Ellen Hopkins remains hopeful that there can be salvaged and believes the opportunity exists for a valuable teaching moment." The author of the book made that statement herself, there can be a valuable teaching moment. Kids can learn for a book that shows bad things and there outcomes, maybe after they read that they'll think twice before doing something.
If the kid is really influenced quick then this book would be really hard for them to understand the concept. But if the child is old enough to understand the concept and be mature enough to handle inappropriate things, without following them then they can understand the bad outcomes. While I was reading the book I was in shock but I was mature enough. I wasn't going to go do drugs because a character in a book said it felt good. No, I know better and this book shows what happened to Kristina at the age of sixteen. If the child is reading the book, the parent can always sit down with there child and explain to them. There child will know some day or another, so how about notify them now before they find some bad influences and understand it the wrong way.
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