Censorship

I am amazed that censorship is still a part of our 21st century world. At first when I was 'politely' asked to remove a link in one of my novels The Garbage Collector on Smashwords, due to the 'graphic' nature of the subject matter; I reluctantly removed the link after some time of thinking it over.

Now my second novel (part of the Taming The Golden Boys of Central High); Summer of my First Time ( Summer Of My First Time) has been banned from the site due to one of the characters being under the age of 18. I would have liked to have acquiesced with their request that I write that all characters are 18 and older; however the point of the entire series is a 'coming of age' story line when teenagers are growing up and discovering life and love.

I'm sorry Smashwords, young adults at some point discover love and sex. It is a part of growing up. I think about when I was 16 and 17 years of age, and the experiences that I had at that time are not unlike what I've written about. To be honest about things, as a teacher in the public school system I've heard the teenagers sharing experiences very much like the ones that I've written about in this story; and not to mention that my #1 best seller The Princess & The Thug was actually written when I was a child of 17 years old still in high school. As a matter of fact it is loosely based on a chance encounter of meeting a young man much like Miles in the story.

But my point of this blog is to ask, at what point does censorship of what we write ends? As authors do we not have the write to tell our character stories as they are told to us? Also where and in what world are these innocent minded kids living? Have you watched what is playing on public TV lately? And you seriously have a problem with me writing a story about a group of teenagers experiences growing up?

I'm just wondering, is there anyone out there that understands my point or would like to weigh in on the subject matter? You don't have to agree with it, but at least let us discuss our rights to present our characters in the light in which we see them.

By Alm Hlgh