Concerning & Potentially Concerning Content

The majority of the concerning content revolves around the main character, Jack. There is no doubt that the main character grows a lot at the end. There is also no doubt that he exhibits behavior Christian parents would not want to see in their kiddos. Jack is a self-proclaimed class clown. Humor is one of our favorite parts of God’s good creation, but the content here steps beyond that. We hear about pranks he has played, such as saran wrapping the school toilets on April Fool’s Day. A chapter is titled “Don’t Try this at Home” with the “Don’t” crossed out. Jack invents a game where he shoots mini-marshmallows at someone to see how many he can hit them with without getting caught. He decides to do this to his teacher while she is at the board teaching. To make it worse he distracts the whole class and even talks another kid into filming it so he can post it later. When he is caught the teacher tells the class she is disappointed in them not speaking up, which he calls “the ultimate guilt trip”. Jack and friend play “rap music” for a video and Jack somewhat dresses up and plays a female character for a funny scene. They reenact a soap opera scene and throw food at each other, all while in his room and knowing he is not allowed. Jack and friend prank by pinning clothes pins to several complete strangers they don’t know at a mall. Jack ends up pinning one to a woman’s skirt. It is meant innocently, but the illustration actually shows him lifting the long skirt a decent bit to pin it. He tells young readers he wants to grow up to be just like a famous MyTube prankster. Jack’s approach to several aspects of his life is unfortunate. Early on Jack says, “Making a fool of myself is my life’s work. I figure that in middle school you’re going to look like a doofus anyway… you might as well own it”. As for school we read, “I always get the answers wrong, so what’s the point?”. We see this play out when on a test he guesses and then starts doodling. He comments in passing that he never turns in his school reading log. He tells young readers, “everyone knows that the kids in the front (of class) never get away with closing their eyes or sneaking a glance at their phones or anything”. He justifies his large number of detentions, saying it’s not that bad considering the year is almost over. He talks during lunch detention any time the teacher walks away. In a really sad scene, he bribes a teacher with food to get out of detention early (the teacher not only takes it, but tells Jack not to tell anyone). He admits to sneaking into his mom’s email to delete an email he didn’t want her to see, with the scene ending with him seemingly feeling totally justified. We hear more about bad grades and past negative school behavior. Jack often worries too much about what others will think about him. He tells us this keeps him going to see a guidance counselor. He is dishonest to his mom several times. He eats in his room despite knowing he isn’t allowed. He considers telling on his brother for doing the same thing, but then realizes he is about to do the same thing, so he doesn’t. When his friend asks if he is worried about being dishonest, he says, almost bragging, “Nah, she’s (mom) used to stuff like this. My brother and I have done way worse”. Later he rolls his eyes behind mom’s back. When his parents delete a video, he says “I want to punch a hole in the wall. This is so stupid!” (with no consequence). He then comes up with a sneaky idea to post a video on a friends account so his mom won’t see it. The dishonesty continues when Jack tries to sneak and check on a prank video while his brother is sleeping using his phone. To again make it worse, his brother catches him, but tells him he has to do his laundry for 2-weeks or he is telling mom. He “secretly borrows” from his brother, which is actually stealing from him, and justifies it. He chooses not to tell his mom about an issue that happened during a tutoring session. He lies to the principal so another kid won’t get in trouble. Late in the book when going to fix mistake the book has him lie to get out of detention, saying “Teachers don’t usually believe me when I use this excuse, because 90% of the time, it’s not true, but I have discovered that if I look miserable enough I can plant a sliver of doubt in their mind and that sliver will eat away at their conscience until they agree to let me go”. Even small things like him sticking his gum under a table for someone else to clean up are unfortunately included. When he starts trying to act a bit better for the sole purpose of getting his phone back, he gets frustrated saying, “I’ve been a straight up angel child”. There is a lot of dishonesty and negative behavior. A girl Brielle justifies going to the bathroom to check her phone, “It’s like the one rule I break, Okay?” She asks Jack later if not breaking rules makes her boring, something that comes up a few times. At one point she refers to people she doesn’t know as “randos”. She and Jack are both far too concerned with their social media following. She sneaks her phone to check on video likes during class (sadly, Jack praises this like it is a good development for her personality and another kid makes fun of her for not having done a bunch of stuff even worse than this, like that is a bad thing). When her dad begins to try and live frugally, she describes it as him always lecturing mom and her, commenting “He wouldn’t even let my mom buy my teeth whitener, like that’s any of his business”. We are also told her mom lies to neighbors and people at church about dad leaving them, saying, “Some truths are too hard to explain” (especially sad about the church side of it, where we should be able to bring all honesty). Another side character explains he can’t tell his parents about something that happened because he doesn’t want to hurt his goal of being seen as more mature. In an odd and concerning scene, Jack goes to a friend’s house to play video games. The game they play turns out to be much more violent than he expected. Then the young reader is told, “That’s when something bad came on the screen. Something involving a man and a woman that I definitely wasn’t ready to see yet”. We read more of his reaction, but the scene ends on a really bad note when Jack comments, “Yeah, I’m never telling mom”, giving a lame justification and ending with a picture of her saying, “Blah blah blah”. So sad. We are told a kid needs a phone with apps “unless you want to be a social outcast”. Jack makes a huge deal later about how terrible a “pay by the minute phone” his dad gets him at Walmart is. Later when having friend trouble Jack comments his phone is “all I have left”. Additional items to consider: Jack says he is addicted to mini marshmallows When his mom reads a few nasty social media comments, Jack thinks “If she thinks these comments are bad, she should walk down the hallway at my school”. Jack says about a friend, “It’s not your fault the woman who birthed him is this way”. A kid Mario calls his mom weird. Brielle about her mom, “She’s sooo beyond embarrassing”. Someone makes the comment “It’s faker than middle school” Jack tells a teacher, “Thank you. Thank you. I worship at your feet” The following terms are used: awesome sauce evil plan, jerk, dumb, farted, teacher’s pet, zombie, chillin like a villain, shove it, weirdo, wicked grin, barf block, holy guacamole, little devil The following references are made: Youtube, Instagram, Marvel movies, Pokemon, Thor, soap operas, zombies