Ellen Trinklein
Opinions Editor
English classes everywhere: it is going to be okay. You can now take that much-needed sigh of relief because, praise Jesus, a new edition of Huckleberry Finn is going to be released. This one will assuage the fears of unassuming English students and nervous English teachers everywhere because, in this new edition, all n-words will be replaced with the word “slave.”
Students will no longer be so drastically and horribly forced to read something that makes them uncomfortable. Oh, that that word sends shivers down my spine. Students are, after all, entitled to their comfort. I am offended, personally, that a book would dare challenge that.
After all, comfort far supersedes the importance of learning Mark Twain’s anti-racist morals. Students should never have to be scared, challenged, or taught, really—not if it means being uncomfortable. Yes, they may have seen Kunta Kinte get violently flogged in the TV series Roots, and yes they may know from World History that 14 million slaves were transported to the America’s, but the n-word? Now that’s going too far.
Or, at least, that is what our society has come to.
It seems to be that “ignorance is bliss” is edging toward public opinion. The release of this new painless edition of Huckleberry Finn shows we would rather be nice and comfy than acknowledge the harsh reality of racist 1880s America.
However, ignoring our society’s history just because it dirties our picture-perfect American past does not change the facts. In writing Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain was not out to be racist. He wrote, as our English teachers have taught us to do for decades, what he knew, which, unjust though it may be, is a world where the n-word was commonplace and blacks were considered three-fifths of a person. What’s more, he wrote to criticize that society and prove that racial equality should exist—and we don’t want to let kids read that?
Many would bring up arguments, like, what if we just taught it to college students who can ‘handle it’? What if we just reduced the number of n-words? These ideas, however, are irrelevant. The issue at hand here is that our society is not willing to move past the guilt, shame and oppression of our past and appreciate what we’ve come to today. Frankly, removing the n-word is a step backward in racial relations. It’s like schools in North Carolina that want to undo integration—it makes no sense.
Perhaps I am being insensitive. I am not black—I do not, nor can I ever, understand the true meaning and hate that too often accompanies the n-word. While rappers may be comfortable throwing it around to “take the fire pin out of the grenade,” as Jay-Z has said, others in the black community, including Oprah and the NAACP, have condemned its use. Oprah’s message was the most powerful: “When I hear the N-word, I still think about every black man who was lynched–and the N-word was the last thing he heard.” Furthermore, from an educational standpoint, it is possible that by removing the n-word altogether, a wider group of people would be able to hear Twain’s anti-racist message (albeit one that is far less striking).
Horrible as the n-word may be, by ignoring it the new addition of Huckleberry Finn attempts to ignore important issues, resulting in students who will be kept from understanding the unfortunate truth of our country’s racial history. Is it uncomfortable? Yes. Awkward? Yes. Inappropriate? If we repeat it, yes. Should it be ignored? Replaced? No.
If America is to move beyond our dark racial past, we can’t be too embarrassed or guilty to accept the truth. Instead, as Mark Twain did with Huckleberry Finn, we should confront it head on.
