Toby Price, an assistant principal of an elementary school in the Hinds County School District in Mississippi, was fired because he read a book to second graders on Zoom called I Need a New Butt! The school board did not approve. Nor did the superintendent.
The school was participating in “Read Across America” day to honor Dr. Seuss’s birthday and to encourage children to love reading. Mr. Price thought the children would find the book hilarious, and they did. But they also got a lesson in the power and danger of books when Mr. Price was fired a few days later. He’s trying to get his job back and has a GoFundMe to support his family and pay a lawyer.
When I first read this story, I sent it to Carol Burris, my friend and executive director of the Network for Public Education. She immediately responded that she must be a criminal grandma because she’s shared that same book with her grandchildren many times, and they love it.
She drafted a confession:
True confession. I am a terrible grandma to my five grandkids. I confess. I bought little Phinney I Need a New Butt! I did not even wait for second grade—I bought it for him when he was two. We would laugh all the way through and he would beg me to read it… again and again and again.
But I did not stop there. I bought a copy for my other two grandkids, Merek and Reeve, then four and two. That’s me, a serial corrupter of young children’s minds.
And if there were a grandma license in the State of Mississippi, then mine would surely be snatched away. I am referring, of course to the tragic ridiculousness of the firing of an assistant principal in Mississippi for reading I Need a New Butt! to second-graders over Zoom.
Anyone who has ever spent any time with young kids knows that silliness is a magnet that draws kids into stories. I devoured Dr. Seuss, limericks, and rhymes as a child. My daughters loved the hilarity of Where the Sidewalk Ends with its rhymes about a child poet in a lion’s belly, baby brothers that ran away, and of course that sack with its mysterious contents (perhaps an extra butt is inside?) Stories with rich rhymes and rhythms build literacy. And maybe a sense of humor—something the world sorely needs.
I worked in schools long enough to figure out the back story on this one. Some self-righteous fool, who likely never liked the man, heard the story and called their friend on the school board. And then a spineless administrator complied, rather than standing up for a man whose life work was spent among children.
It’s a chilling tale of power and fear and extremism. And worst of all, the children of Gary Road Elementary lost someone who understands them, only to be left with school leaders whose butts may be tight and intact, but most certainly have cracks in their hearts and heads.
So, here’s the irony: I Need a New Butt! is now #1 bestseller on Amazon’s list of beginning readers for children.
The word should go out to every school board and legislature in the nation: whenever you ban a book, its sales will soar! Authors will wear your ban as a badge of honor. They may even ask you to ban their books so they too will benefit. Don’t do it!
Reblogged this on Crazy Normal – the Classroom Exposé and commented:
The FEAR and POWER engine of the fascist, extreme-right [that’s fallen off the edge of their flat earth] kleptocratic crime syndicate declared war on I NEED A NEW BUTT!
What about banned the Bible for all its sex and violence?
Not the greatest piece of literature.,but I’m sure the second graders found it hysterical. It’s very funny. Reading this book is no reason to fire anyone.
Another book that has been banned by some libraries is the picture book, ‘Everybody Poops.’ Nothing delights children more than a book on this topic. This book is really an early science book on digestion and elimination in the animal kingdom. It is sad that the “morality police” find such harmless books offensive. This book can be found online. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcyjhyA9l1U
My pre-K children and now my grandchildren love this book. My grandson then three wanted to know what whale poop looked like. So we looked it up. He loves reading this when he uses the potty.
I was just thinking I will end up in mommy jail for reading Everybody Poops and The Gas We Pass to my kids. They are obviously warped—bristling with degrees, one is a teacher and the other is an accountant. Can they ever forgive me?
LOL. I, too, will end up in Repugnican parent jail for buying, for my kids, Heather Has Two Mommies and In the Night Kitchen.
Don’t we all.
Don’t we all.
LOL
Yes, and where are the teachers’ unions on this? Academic freedom is of great importance and should be a part of union contracts. I realize, of course, that not all school districts–especially in the South–have teachers’ unions, though many are a part of NEA. By academic freedom I don’t mean the teacher is free to do or read just anything, of course, but free to choose lessons that most other professional educators would find suitable for the given age group and subject. Teachers all have considerable education and most have considerable experience with kids. We can’t let the narrowmindedness of some in authority–or their timidity which argues for books that offend (or inspire) no one. It’s a neverending struggle with some communities and their prejudices, but I found, as a teacher, if we could get the parents into “open house” or some other conference setting they could be convinced that what we were doing was in the children’s best interests. I confess, though, that I did have a high school girl whose parents objected to a movie I was showing, so that I had to allow her to sit in the hall and read a different story.
One of the courses I taught was Intro to Film, and I was told that I could only show G-rated movies. LOL. Impossible, insane. It’s like being told that one is to teach Music Theory but using only the first 3 notes of the C Major scale. The folks who made this rule had no freaking clue.
cx: could show only
This is what the “parents rights” folks have become. The parents’ rights’ groups succeeded in canceling an assistant principal for reading this book. “Parents’ rights” is just another name for cancel culture and censorship by a very small number of right wing parents who feel entitled – due to their connections to rich folks — to dictate to public schools and teachers what can be taught.
The right wing attack on public education includes a propaganda campaign on conservative media in order to get parents agitated so they will cause a disruption at school board meetings and in schools. Most of the banned books have been in schools for years without problems. The real motive is to sow seeds of mistrust in public education.
@ NYC public school parent
So parents don’t have rights? Shouldn’t have rights? I find your blanket comment rather ridiculous.
““Parents’ rights” is just another name for cancel culture and censorship by a very small number of right wing parents who feel entitled…
Notice the phrase “by a very small number of…”
Clarity,
You are expressing the Orwellian view:
“All parents are equal, but some parents are more equal than other parents and those are the parents who must rule.”
ALL parents have rights, Clarity, not just the small number of bullying parents who want to cancel anything that they don’t like who believe they are “more equal” than the majority of parents who disagree because they have “might” (right wing billionaires) on their side. Might doesn’t make right.
All parents should have rights, Clarity. But parents who are bullies should not get to dictate to other parent just because the other parents aren’t as reprehensible and bullying as the bullying parents.
Might doesn’t make right, Clarity, and ALL parents should have rights, not just the ones who bully. Why don’t you agree with that?
Do folks realize this book was written by a New Zealand author. I am guessing that the far right is now going to attack New Zealand as a bastion of political correctness??
How soon before the new talking point of the pro-censorship right wing “parents rights” groups is going to be “New Zealand is a dangerous place for children where schools and teachers and writers are filling young children’s minds with political correctness and teaching them sex education at an early age?”
How soon before Tucker Carlson devotes every night to big stories where he invites the leaders of “parents rights” groups on to talk about the horrible things being done to young children in evil New Zealand? They have no shame in manufacturing “dangers” that don’t exist.
Oh, he’s already on it – he was furiously attacking our Covid strategy while it was still possible to eliminate the virus: https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2021/9/20/new-zealand-is-on-its-way-of-eradicating-covid-19-again
Next thing you know, Captain Underpants will be headed for the skids.
I think loathe to see Underpants soiled.
It’s official now. Anti-CRT is a pain in the butt.
This reminds me of the funny children’s show in Denmark about a man with an enormous penis. https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/07/europe/denmark-john-dillermand-controversy-scli-intl/index.html Rightwing politicians over there didn’t understand either.
I think people loathe, that is.
I messed up a good bad joke.
While this funny and cute, it does not fit into the deep reservoir of wonderful children’s lit that is a growing body of deep thematic literature and amazing art my daughter perused as a wee youth. Trying to ban it is foolish, of course, almost as funny as the book itself.
“Job satisfaction is at an “ultimate low” with almost four in 10 principals saying they are likely to leave the profession in the next three years, according to the National Association of Secondary School Principals’ survey.”
https://districtadministration.com/4-signs-school-principals-quit-covid-political-tensions/
It would be prudent for the district to reevaluate Toby Price’s firing. Twenty years in education is not IMO a community investment in leadership the district should let go lightly. For future reference- and a shout-out to school librarians-run you selections by a school librarian. School librarians read daily to large groups of students and have a wealth of knowledge of children’s literature to guide book selection. They also have experience with challenged books and materials.
Twenty years in education is not IMO a community investment in leadership the district should let go lightly.
Exactly. Most of the job is learned on the job.
Not only did I purchase that book for my then 4 year old, but I deigned to get her the “cheeky sequel to the international bestseller ‘I Need a New Butt!’” called “I Broke My Butt!”
Should I be concerned about child services?
(Sorry I cannot underline or bold the titles on here.)
LOL
Ordering this for my grandkids Abram and Allie!
Furious that Mr. Price was fired for this. Soon, only idiots will remain in our schools, and the schools will be fascist fundamentalist madrasas.
He was an AP at the HINDS County School District. OMG. One can’t make this stuff up. How appropriate. This district is run by asses.
omg perfect!
Asses! You crack me up!
A bum rap, this.
You are both very funny. Thanks for even more laughs!
testing
I just ordered it!
Other than the butt cheeks and face cheeks appearing like nipples which is odd and maybe not something kids are likely to notice, I’d think most little ones would find this hilarious. What did the 2nd graders think of the book?
All this reminds me of when John Ashcroft had curtains installed to hide the partial nudity of the statue of Lady Justice (“Spirit of Justice”) at the Department of Justice. I thought at the time that being as Puritanical as Ashcroft was had to be its own punishment. What a twisted, narrowed life such a person must have!
So, I guess we can’t even be allowed to get access to Wow! in the World because it has too many contents that may sound offensive to grown-ups, like “This is a big but(t)!” Hmmm.