Reveal Your True Form by Luci

In American Born Chinese, Gene Yang helps readers to understand that people need a sage to help them value who they truly are. Although, most people think that only parents are the only wise people that can help, most of the time they aren’t. The first person in the story to be helped is the Monkey King, he was helped by a god name Tze-Yo-Tzuh. In the story, the Monkey King changes to become more powerful, he changes to please someone else, when he does this Tze-Yo-Tzuh tests the idea of be the Great Sage, Equal of Heaven. Tze-Yo-Tzuh puts the Monkey King under a pile of rocks for 500 years. Then, Tze-Yo-Tzuh sends a monk to help him, at first the Monkey King does not want help. But when the monk gets attacked by two trolls, the Monkey King is forced to help. Once he helped the monk he then called the monk “master.” This shows that The Monkey King finally accepted who he was and decided to help the wounded monk. After the Monkey King went and helped Jin discover who he truly was and will forever be. On page 213 The Monkey King says “Now that I have revealed my true form, perhaps it is time to reveal yours… Jin Wang,” Jin then turns from the blond haired blue eyed all american boy, back to his true form. Later once Jin was helped to accept who he truly was he then went to Wei-Chen and began to bring back who he truly is. The Monkey King said that he could not help Wei-Chen because he would not listen. Jin waited at a diner until closing every day for a month until Wei-Chen came. When he finally came, Jin saw an image of Wei-Chen before he became a real boy. Jin then apologized for how he treated him when they were in Jr. High. When Wei-Chen needed someone to reveal his true self, it wasn’t his dad, it was Jin his best friend. Sometimes parents aren’t the only ones who can help.

Gene Home

American Born Chinese, page 213

American Born Chinese, page 143

What is Normal? By: Luci

People find autism embarrassing because of unexpected behaviors. Firstly, sometimes people with autism have tantrums that can be scary for those who are inexperienced. For example in Rules, when David, Catherine, and their dad were in the video store, David had a tantrum and a random guy came over and just stared because he had probably never seen something like it before. Also, Grace Bourne said that sometime when they are in the mall with Mac she is afraid he is going to a tantrum. People with autism are misunderstood as “weird” or “not normal” just because of the way they act. In the book when Jason was at OT the speech therapist was talking to him like he was stupid just because he was different or “not normal”. Also, when Catherine introduced Jason to Kristi, Kristi was mean about it just because she thought he was different. Lastly, I think that family members of an autistic person are the only people that really understand them. For example, Catherine is the only one who really understands David, and tells him what to do and she also knows what he needs. Catherine is the one that understands Jason and knows that Jason has so much going on in his head, he just can’t express it. In conclusion, sometimes people stereotypically think that people with disabilities are stupid or don’t understand what “normal” people can and that is what Cynthia Lord was trying to show in her book, there is no normal everyone is their own kind of normal.

Banning Books? Seriously? By Luci

Books should not be banned in middle schools. Books offer safe opportunities for kids to learn life lessons. For example, in Rules they show the readers how not to act people who aren’t “normal”, the book also questions “what is normal?”. Another example is from the book Fish in a Tree; the main character is “not normal” so everyone in her class treats her that way until a new teacher comes and shows the class that everyone is different and just because someone could be different doesn’t mean they aren’t “normal.” Books provide intellectual freedom. Picking out your own book is a sort of freedom, so when parents banned certain book it takes that privilege away. When parents banned certain books, and we can only read the “ok” books, those may not interest kids and who may mean that they won’t want to read. Some parents think that if their kids read it, they will do it, this fact is wrong. When parents assume if kids read it they will do it, that takes away trust. Also, how do parents know for sure, their kids are going to it if they see it? That is likes assuming if your friends ask you to jump off a bridge you would do it. In conclusion, if parents continue to ban books then kids could be affected in ways that may have been worse than some of the things that cause parents to ban books.