You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post about book banning and censorship. YCRT! features news and opinion roundups, commentary, history, and reviews.
YCRT! Rant
In an earlier YCRT! post I highlighted a policy statement issued by the U. S. Department of Education four days after Trump’s inauguration. The statement, which reads more like an editorial in Breitbart News than an official announcement from a cabinet-level department of the U.S. government, is titled U.S. Department of Education Ends Biden’s Book Ban Hoax.
Here is some of what I said then:
So how’s the battle against book-banning going lately? The pinheads we’ve warned you about, fought against, taken to court, subverted with work-arounds, subjected to public ridicule and shame — the torch & pitchfork book-burning mob — are suddenly the boss of us. […] If past actions […] are any indication, within a month or two the Party of Local Control and States’ Rights will have implemented a top-down book-banning policy on public education in the United States. Every elementary, middle, and high school will ban “age-inappropriate materials” from classrooms and libraries, and you can bet publicly-funded state colleges and universities will be next, along with public libraries.
If it is within their power to force the Idaho model on the remaining 49 states, do you think for a second they’ll hesitate?
How might this top-down book-banning policy on public education go? No need to wonder, it’s happening right before our eyes.
The Trump administration has already ordered Department of Defense-operated schools, which are attended by some 67,000 military dependent children at overseas bases, to suspend DEI admission, hiring, and promotion policies, and to purge classrooms and libraries of lessons and books it deems “potentially related to gender ideology or discriminatory equity ideology.”
Seeking to expand its reach to public schools at home, which unlike DoD-operated schools are not under its direct control, the Trump administration is threatening departments of education in all 50 states — agencies which oversee public elementary, middle, and high schools in their jurisdictions — with a cutoff of federal funding if they do not immediately revoke DEI hiring policies.
I suspect it won’t be long before the administration issues similar funding cutoff threats aimed at public school curricula, teaching materials, textbooks, and school libraries containing the content described above, plus anything society’s lowest common denominators define as “age-inappropriate” and “anti-American.” The threat of withholding federal funding and grants can also be applied to colleges, universities, and public libraries.
If ever there was a time to fight back, it is now.
YCRT! News Roundup
What Publishing Can Do About Trump: Preserve the Independence of Our Bookstores and Libraries (Literary Hub)
Public libraries provide access to books and many, many other resources for personal and communal growth so that anyone, regardless of their race, religion, or economic class can be active citizens with the potential to grow in wealth and wisdom. Anyone can get a library card, and anyone with a library card can discover the world is much bigger with many more possibilities for how to live your life than what their parents, their teachers, their religious leaders, and Fox News have told them. No wonder conservatives hate libraries.
Book Bans Could Escalate After Department of Education Dismisses Censorship Complaints (Axios)
“We are seeing courts reject the idea that government officials can dictate what we’re allowed to read,” she said. “But without federal oversight, school boards and libraries are under enormous pressure to censor content.”
Florida School Bans Amanda Gorman’s Inaugural Poem (Blavity)
A Miami-Dade County elementary school has removed Amanda Gorman’s presidential inauguration poem “The Hill We Climb” from its bookshelves. The school moved the poem to the middle school section after a parent objected to it, reported the Miami Herald.
ACLU Sues on Behalf of Librarian Fired After Opposing Book Censorship Effort (The Guardian)
Hector was fired after a group called the Saline County Republican Women began a campaign urging the censorship of books that touched on race or LGBTQ+ themes. Hector spoke out against a resolution the quorum court, the county’s governing board, passed calling for such books to be moved to areas not accessible by children. The quorum court later passed an ordinance taking away the library board’s authority to hire and fire library staff, instead giving that power to the county judge. Brumley fired Hector less than two months later.
Multi-Level Barrage of US Book Bans Is ‘Unprecedented’, Says Pen America (The Guardian)
PEN America, one of America’s largest non-profits dedicated to protecting free expression in literature and beyond, warns that the current barrage of book bans and the growing traction of the movement is dangerously reminiscent of authoritarian regimes throughout history. “What we’re seeing right now mirrors elements of different historical periods, but this has never all happened at once,” Jonathan Friedman, Sy Syms managing director for US free expression programs at PEN America, said.
Arkansas State Library Board Refuses to Reject American Library Association, Withhold Funds (Arkansas Advocate)
The Arkansas State Library Board rejected member Jason Rapert’s attempt Friday to remove references to the American Library Association from its policies and to ensure the funds it distributes do not support ALA membership or programming. Rapert, a former Republican state senator from Conway, spent several minutes of Friday’s three-hour board meeting denouncing ALA as “toxic” and reiterating his stance that minors should not have access to “sexually explicit” content in libraries.
The List of Trump’s Forbidden Words (Gizmodo)
It’s still not clear what happens on the other side of all this. But when they’re flagging words like “women” and “trauma,” less than three weeks in, it can’t be good.
‘Free Societies Don’t Ban Books’: State Bill Aims to Protect Public School Libraries from Book Bans (Fox31/Denver)
“This bill will ensure that the next generation of Coloradans has the opportunity to access a broad spectrum of literature, including works that might challenge preconceived notions or present uncomfortable truths.”