Time To Burn Some Books: Let’s Start With The Fault In Our Stars

There's a good way to get rid of stuff you don't like and don't want others to see. It's called "burning it."

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Featureflash / (Shutterstock.com)
Featureflash / (Shutterstock.com)

I’m super-mad at something. Like, I can’t even breathe as I’m writing this. That fucking Augustus Waters and that John Green…God, I’m mad…if you like that book you’ve got to be a fucking idiot—anyway, I’ll get to that.

There’s a good way to get rid of stuff you don’t like and don’t want others to see. It’s called “burning it.” I don’t see why it isn’t done more, I mean there’s so many sexist, racist, and homophobic things that should be eaten by Flames of Tolerance to ensure nobody’s offended by them.

Perhaps the easiest thing to burn is books, cuz they’re made of paper and paper is made of rain forests. Many books contain bad things that can offend people and these books should be burned. But you yourself can’t go ahead and decide which books to burn—no—a jury of the most intellectual and, like, logical people in any given society must decide which of all the gazillion books in the world must be burned.

In our particular society, this intellectual elite is, of course, made up out of strong independent feminists and social-justice activists.

A couple of years back they edited out the “N” word in Tom Sawyer’s Nickelberry Finn. This was totally great, as it took some of my guilt about what we did to them away, but it was only a baby step. We need to make a giant leap, like Lance Armstrong, and make sure all books that contain words and content that can offend women, gays, and minorities must be totally incinerated. Words hurt and do we really want a society where the oppressed groups are VISUALLY ASSAULTED every time they open a. Fucking. Book?

A book that’s been like really popular the last few years is The Fault in our Stars. Teenage girls seem to totally love it, almost worship it. At first, when I saw my slightly younger sistahs posting Instapics of the cover I thought it was a strong book for strong young girls about the prestigious science of astrology, but then, I learnt to my total horror that the author was John Green. John Green, for those of you who don’t know, is this total dweeb from YouTube who makes videos about science from a very patriarchal point of view. They’re full of phallocentric “facts” and “logic” but always neglect to express what women of color’s feelings are on certain scientific topics. In spite of all this I had to pick up the book; I am a very cultural young woman after all.

What. I. Read. Was. Shocking.

First off, the book is about a girl called Hazel Grace. WTF? What kind of a name is that, I thought at first, but then I went on the Internet and began exploring the deep and dark crevices of John Green’s mind, and it became obvious that “Hazel” is alluding to the tree called Hazel. So yeah, Green is basically saying that his lead female character is as charismatic as a piece of wood. Sexist much? Oh, and Grace? Like in Christianity? So you’re saying she’s supposed to be a good little church girl for your sexual gratification? Huh? Dirty old man.

Anyway, so this girl has cancer, can’t breathe properly, and has no hair. Surprised? No, cuz of course Green has chosen to portray the female lead as weak and sickly without hair. (Hair is a sign of beauty and womanhood according to the patriarchy.) Without delving too deep, it’s obvious that Green seems to have a power fantasy where he makes women, who we all know are strong and independent, seem like weak people who’re out of breath. Cancer is apparently deadly, so Hazel Grace is afraid she’s gonna die—this represents Green’s obsession with the extinction of womankind.

At the hospital or whatever, Hazel meets a legless boy called Augustus Waters (an extremely pretentious name) who used to be a basketball player even though he’s white. They hit it off after he tells Hazel that she looks like Natalie Portman—yeah. OK—so now she’s being judged on her appearance first thing. Did he really just go there? It becomes clear to anyone with a brain bigger than a hazelnut that Green is channeling his own sexist views of what a woman should look like through the mouth of Mr. Pretentious Name. Anyways, so then he invites her to his house to “watch a movie” and they talk about cancer or something and dying and shit.

Fast-forward—they go to Amsterdam cuz they’re in love and want to see the Red Light District before they both die or something like that. While they’re there they go to Anne Frank’s house, you know the lesbian Jewess who became mentally ill and wrote in a diary about going back into the closet to a land called Narnia during the Hitler War, and they literally kiss in that house. Do you know how disrespectful that is to the six billion Jews who were killed by Hitler in his shower? Kissing in that holy place is literally like braving the prickliest and most anti-simscityic of all mustaches to arrive at the thin lips of Adolf Hitler. So yeah I think we can safely say that John Green is a Nazi. Do we really want young teens to be exposed to the teachings of the Führer at that tender age? They might get the wrong idea.

Anyway then they both die and shit and it’s really sad cuz they had fallen in love with each other even though they have cancer.

Now as you can see, The Fault in Our Stars is packed to the rafters with sexism, homophobia, and Nazism—therefore, all copies must totally burned already—but if someone disagrees still, they won’t after they’ve heard the biggest thing about this book. Indeed, there’s one thing that really breaks the straw of the camel out the back and will make everyone put their copy in the oven right this moment—you wanna know what it is? I’ll tell you what it is all right: WHENEVER I GOOGLE MY FUCKING NAME TO READ WHAT MY FANS ARE WRITING ABOUT ME, LIKE 90% OF ALL RESULTS ARE ABOUT “GUS AND HAZEL KISSING IN ANNE FRANK’S HOUSE.” I AM GETTING SO FUCKING MAD AT IT. I CAN’T FUCKING TAKE THEM HIJACKING MY NAMES, TAKING VALUABLE GOOGLE SPACE FROM ME, ANNE GUS, THE VOICE OF A GENERATION AND THE PRETTIEST GIRL IN BOSTON. ALL. COPIES. OF. THAT. BOOK. MUST. BE. BURNED. BECAUSE. IT’S.TRIGGERING.ME

I want my Google results back, John Green. I will make sure your little “novel” is wiped off the face of the Earth.

To show your support, tweet under the hashtag #BurnTheFaultyStars. Thought Catalog Logo Mark