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Originally posted by FutureMrsFIllion:

The district wants to remove "Vamos a Cuba" ("A Visit to Cuba") following a parent's complaint that it failed to accurately depict the reality of life under Cuba's communist government.

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excerpted from http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6364993.html
What did you think of the "Visit to…" series?

Some people in the Cuban community felt that it did not paint an accurate picture of Cuba because it did not mention Castro and the oppression under Castro. I looked at the entire series; I read them all. One of the points I made in my affidavit was that ages four to eight cognitively really don't "get" the concept of government. They are establishing their own place within the community; "community" may be their neighborhood, their town or city, or even their classroom in their school. But as far as a broader picture of government, they don't {have one}. So what the case was all about was what was omitted rather than what was included.

What else did the board object to about the Cuba book?

It said that in Cuba, for special festivals, men wear white pants and white shirts, and women wear bright-colored skirts with ruffles. And they said only the rich would do that. I raised the case in the affidavit that in Scotland—I did look at the book on Scotland—and guess what? They showed a kilt. Well, people in Scotland don't walk around in a kilt, and they're so expensive, mostly only the rich wear them unless they make their own.

During your testimony, what did the school board's attorney ask you?

They had an expert witness, a woman Ph.D psychologist who said that lying to children will cause them damage. And they claimed that by omitting information from these books, it was indeed a lie. So I put in my affidavit that in the case of children ages four to eight sometimes in a nonfiction work too much information can be more damaging than too little. And they kept going on to me about this: "Well do you think it's too much information to say that the children in Cuba are poor?" And I said no, but {that detail is} in the book. It says children go to school part of the day and work the other part. And it's in the pictures.

What did you testify to under rebuttal questioning by the ACLU's attorney?

I said, "Based on what I have observed in this courtroom today it appears to me that the reason the books were removed is because of the personal and political convictions of the adults and their {attempt} to inflict their own convictions on children and children's books."

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