Hat tip to the Mighty Red Pen for this gem: in California, the Menifee Union School District has removed Merriam-Webster’s 10th-edition dictionary from elementary school shelves because it has an entry for “oral sex.”

If I was to write a dictionary, now I know just what I’d put next to my entry for “futility.”

Here’s Riverside’s Press-Enterprise:

School officials will review the dictionary to decide if it should be permanently banned because of the “sexually graphic” entry, said district spokeswoman Betti Cadmus. The dictionaries were initially purchased a few years ago for fourth- and fifth-grade classrooms districtwide, according to a memo to the superintendent.

“It’s hard to sit and read the dictionary, but we’ll be looking to find other things of a graphic nature,” Cadmus said. She explained that other dictionary entries defining human anatomy would probably not be cause for alarm.

“It’s just not age appropriate,” said Cadmus, adding that this is the first time a book has been removed from classrooms throughout the district.

MRP quips:

Heaven forfend that a parent of a 9 or 10 year old should use it as a teachable moment if their kid comes across a term such as oral sex when they are searching the dictionary for the definitions between oracular and ornamental.

I hardly think we should be standing in the way of kids getting proper information about s-e-x, and any youngster who is intrepid enough to look in the dictionary to find out what it’s all about shouldn’t be dissuaded from educating themselves. It’s not as though Merriam-Webster is some kind of gateway porn.

Me, I’m totally behind Betti Cadmus. What’s more American than dealing with uncomfortable things by blithely pretending that they do not exist? I’m sure if we eliminate “age-inappropriate” words from a dictionary, we will definitely eliminate the activities those words describe from the pristine minds of our children. That’s fool-proof.

And it’s about time these pre-teens learned the values that their country was founded on, like sticking your head in the sand.

In fact, while we’re at it, why not cut the entries for “murder,” “global warming,” and “taxes?” It’s ingenious, really. Don’t approve of something? Embarrassed by having to explain something to Junior? Cut it from the dictionary. DONE. Never again will you have to endure a moment of actual parenting.

I mean, how many words does a dictionary need anyway? I’m sure we could get by just fine with a handful, like “dismemberment,” “self-tanner” and “Cleveland.”

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