Racial controversy

[JADJARHD]

This is not about the book or the themes, its about the people who are angry. There are angry people in this world that only need a pretext to trigger their passions. Twain was a white man, he used the N-word in his book, therefore Twain is must be a racist. The true meaning of the text, nor the signifigance of when racism is demonstrated and when it is not doesn't matter to these people. Many of them are probably not willing to actually read the book and find its deeper meaning.

It amazes me that 90% of rappers can use the N-word in their songs, but an antislavery novel from the 19th century cannot. There is a very large intellectual deficit in this equation.

[stormgirl_blue]

I believe someone might be using the trendy word “racist”, I am absolutely passionate that there is nothing RACIST about the characters in Huck Finn, or Mark Twain
If perhaps you need to label the characters,” ignorant” is the right word, and this was only a sign of the times.
Twain himself shows to be a very compassionate man who could never be accused of racism or even ignorance of his time.
His novel unashamedly presented a friendship between a white boy and a black man, written in the ignorant age; it was extremely warm and human.
I could not respect twain more than I do, and greatly for his compassion and understanding of the human condition.

[Coco]

Twain said, "Huck Finn is a book of mine about a sound heart that comes into conflict with a deformed conscience . . . and conscience suffers defeat." (this may not be the exact wording but it's close.

How is conscience formed? By society. Huck finds out for himself that the society's popular view of Negroes as stupid, violent, animals that are property is a lot of nonsense. Jim is a better father to Huck than Pap. He is a beter man than most of the white men in the novel. So Huck rejects the society that says he will go to hell for helping a slave to escape.

Such a defeat of conscience is what is needed to help society to progress.

[Ravenna]

I agree totally that Huckleberry Finn was not a racist book. We should look closer at the author to study his live and times - his wins (few), his losses (many) to see his portrayal of human nature in Huckleberry Finn reflected the mood of the day. Here we are some 124 years later 'worrying' about racism when we are in an age when political correctness has swung the pendulum the other way and tells us that if you are white, male, heterosexual and fit - you should be in the minority. (That doesn't include me by the way but conveys the point I'm driving at!!). Human beings are fickle followers of 'fashion' - whether in clothes, music, icons etc. The book was written for the time of the 1800s. When the Romans were around, lions chased (white) Christians around the arena and unwanted babies were dumped in sewers. For them, that was 'normal' in their everyday world. WE are shocked by these events today. Probably in the year 2078 or whenever, our descendents will look back and laugh at 'us' for typing out our opinions on internet chatrooms: 'How old fashioned' they will say - what strange ideas they had! ...

Mark Twain was exceptional. All his work had a message. We should open up our minds to his texts.