Problem, which should be blazingly obvious to anybody who actually thinks about it, is that if school districts buy the bowdlerized version, the education of kids who read it is shortchanged.

It's good for kids to grapple with the problems of language sensitivity--and to get a true reflection of racial attitudes at the time Twain was writing.

Of course teachers need to play a crucial role here--and if teachers don't have the leeway to explain the use of "nigger" in historical and social context, that is what really needs to change.

To accept less than 1) teaching the book (Huck) and 2) teaching it as originally written is an abdication of responsibility by society, a travesty of Twain---and a shining example of PC stupidity--as noted in the opening post.