I have always been so baffled by the censorship of books of any kind. I was reading constantly as a child - to the point where I had almost literally exhausted all the books in the children's section of my town's small library by the time I was about 10. The YA section was even more pathetic, I decided they were all not worth my time, and I moved straight on to the adult section.

The librarian almost dropped dead when my mother let me read "Firestarter" and "Carrie" when I was 12. They scared the hell out of me, but I've always been glad that no one told me I couldn't read them.

I realize that censoring books for their ideological content is different than censoring them for age-appropriateness, but I still just don't get it. I think my bottom line is that if you have been instilling XYZ values into a child their whole life and you think that one book which disagrees is going to undo everything you've ever taught them - you just didn't do a very good job.

Or it's as though they're afraid that if a child - or adult - finds out that there's any other way to think, a lifetime of learning one way will be overcome.

I had problems when I was a kid that I was reading way above my age level and was bored with most of what was in the children's section. They finally let me check out adult books when I was 12. My parents didn't say I couldn't read any particular book, although some were hidden from me (but not vey well).

I'm so glad neither my parents nor my library restricted my reading level. I know that I did try to read at least one book too soon (GWTW in 3rd grade--still cannot stand that book to this day), but neither of my parents stopped me when I read Roots in 5th grade, nor did Mom take away the Rosemary Rogers bodice-rippers I started reading in 6th grade.

I think that Mom figured that, as the youngest, I'd be picking up whatever my older sibs were reading anyway, and she knew I'd ask her if I had any questions (that I didn't already answer by doing my own research--I've always tended to do that from day 1), so she let me loose amongst the stacks. My librarians all knew me or got to know me really quickly, so they knew to let me read whatever. The advantages of a small storefront branch library!

My parents didn't say I couldn't read any particular book, although some were hidden from me (but not vey well).

Yeah, I'll be hiding the porn when my kids start to read. It's just not something I want to share with my kids, and I assume they will feel the same way. (I also have no doubt that by the time they're old enough to be interested in such things, they will have the necessary skills to aquire their own. Or they can just learn about sex from Anne Rice and Robert Heinlein like I did.)

I was relatively late in reading adult books in the library. I started with mysteries (mostly Erle Stanley Gardner and Ellery Queen) and quickly graduated to true crime.

But I had problems with access to a public library for a long time. We lived in the country. When I was about 7 or 8, the public library in town adopted a policy of city-residents-only. (The theory, as I remember hearing it, was that only the town's taxpayers supported the library, so only the town's residents should be allowed to use it.) So for a while, I only had access to the school library.

We eventually started going to the public library in another town, near the bowling alley where I (and later my brother) were in a Saturday morning kids' league. Which wasn't only in another town, but another state. Which really knocked the taxpayers-only argument for a loop.

My parents were relatively strict about my reading habits for a while. But by 8th grade, I was reading Jaws (in one day) and The Godfather. The Godfather in particular was very educational.

You'll also have to block certain sites on any computer they have access to and watch your Kindle/Nook/whatever.

hah! and they say literacy is declining, when there are more and more ways to read (porn or otherwise).

I can only remember my mother ever banning one book, Jephte's Daughter by Naomi Ragen. I'd already started reading it, and she took it away from me. I still have no idea why that book provoked that reaction when no other book ever did, especially since it was when I was about 13 and had already read plenty of books that most people would consider much less appropriate. I asked her about it a few years ago, and she couldn't remember the incident at all. Similarly, the only movie I can ever remember her saying I couldn't see was Murder in the First.

I did get in some trouble for reading trashy romances while still in middle school--I switched to the no-sex regencies, which were begrudingly approved, and eventually started sneaking the "real thing" back in.

More, I think, was the issue of reading books too young to really get it--I read Watership Down in 4th grade, and while I understood it in terms of plot and words and stuff, I didn't really GET it. There were at least a couple books that summer that I tried reading and stopped because they were "boring" but I think they were just over my head!:)

My teacher had some objections when I read A Time To Kill in sixth grade, but she called my mom and my mom said it was OK. Same thing happened with the librarian when I tried to borrow Uncle Tom's Cabin from the library in second grade. (I didn't actually read that one then -- I tried, but sounding out the dialect was way above my reading level at the time.)

My parents gave me Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (*but were afraid to ask) when I was 9, and started asking.

Then I just picked up the copies of The Sensuous Man and The Sensuous Woman that were lying around.

But reading porn as a pre-pubescent is pretty much an anthropological endeavor.

However, it did warp my values so that I believed that willingness to go down on your partner was nothing short of a moral obligation.