Removal of Dictionaries in Schools

It is absolutely ridiculous and unheard of to pull a dictionary from the shelves of a school just because parents’ attention is brought to one controversial word. ‘Oral sex’, whether approved of or not, is a set of words used to describe a verb in the human language. I’m 100% in agreement with the parent, Jason Rodgers. He asked, “What are they going to do next? Take the encyclopedia books out because the mention of the words penis and vagina?” You do have to draw the line somewhere. If every book or text segment that had something vulgar or controversial was taken away from us, what would we learn from? Books wouldn’t exist! For God’s sake, even Where’s Waldo is on the list of books deemed challenged. I do agree with the fact that it may not be “age appropriate”, but it’s a dictionary! A dictionary is purposely made to define and explain words in the human language for all ages. No one ever said that Merriam Webster’s Dictionary was a children’s book! Also, you can’t penalize an entire group of kids who are willing to learn just because one child wants to be ‘cute’ and look up words which are frowned upon. If I had a child in school that chose to look up these words, I wouldn’t mind one bit. At least he/she would be getting the correct information on what the word really means instead referring to their amateurish friends on the matter. At one time or another, a child will be exposed to things we don’t believe they should at the age, or to at all. The television shows that are shown these days aren’t screened like they used to be. People in public are a lot less courteous with the language they use. Not to mention the internet is available to everyone and holds anything you could ever imagine. Schools in California and anywhere else for that matter really need to put things into consideration before discontinuing a dictionary in middle school classrooms.