Teens Fight for the Right to Read, Write, And Speak

An important and frequently overlooked component of preserving tweens' and teens' right to read or write or speak is the role they themselves play. Youth demonstrate admirable strength in combatting challenges to free speech in both fact and fiction. Their struggles against censorship have taken several teens all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Some teens in real life have won their fight, some have lost; the same happens in fiction. Regardless of the outcome, these teens can influence and inspire others to stand tall when the censor knocks at the door. For a reader, they can transform the threat of censorship and its emotional aftermath into reality. The accounts of their actions can inform both other teens and adults of possible strategies for combatting attempts to impose limits on the invaluable right of free expression. Although in the fictional accounts, the censors, fairly or unfairly, are sometimes portrayed as one-dimensional, the teens are uniformly created as characters with depth of thought and reflective action. The common theme throughout these tweens' and teens' stories is their emerging courage and determination to speak up and take action against censorship.