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Tell both Pros and Cons on why and why not parents should have the right to decide on what their kids are reading

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© Atlantide Phototravel-Corbis Documentary/Getty Images

To access extended pro and con arguments, sources, and discussion questions about whether parents or other adults should be able to ban books from schools and libraries, go to ProCon.org.

The American Library Association (ALA) has tracked book challenges, which are attempts to remove or restrict materials, since 1990. In 2020, the ALA recorded 156 reported book challenges in the United States, a significant decrease from the 377 reported challenges in 2019 perhaps due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, challenges jumped to an all-time high in 2021 with 729 challenges, containing a total of 1,597 books.

In most years, about 10% of the reported challenges result in removal or ban from the school or library. However, in 2016, five of the top ten most challenged books were removed. The ALA estimates that only about 3% to 18% of challenges are reported to its Office for Intellectual Freedom, meaning that the actual number of attempts to ban books is likely much higher.

In 2021, challenges were most frequently brought by parents (39%), followed by patrons (24%), a board or administration (18%), librarians or teachers (6%), elected officials (2%), and students (1%). Books were most often challenged at school libraries (44%), public libraries (37%), schools (18%), and academic libraries (1%).

Sexually explicit content, offensive language, and "unsuited to any age group" are the top three reasons cited for requesting a book be removed. The percentage of Americans who think any books should be banned increased from 18% in 2011 to 28% in 2015, and 60% of people surveyed believed that children should not have access to books containing explicit language in school libraries, according to The Harris Poll. A 2022 poll found 71% disagreed with efforts to have books removed, including 75% of Democrats, 58% of independents, and 70% of Republicans.

Parents have the right to decide what material their children are exposed to and when.

Children should not be exposed to sex, violence, drug use, or other inappropriate topics in school or public libraries.

Keeping books with inappropriate content out of libraries protects kids, but doesn't stop people from reading those books or prevent authors from writing them.

Parents may control what their own children read, but don't have a right to restrict what books are available to other people.

Many frequently challenged books help people get a better idea of the world and their place in it.

Books are a portal to different life experiences and reading encourages empathy and social-emotional development.

This article was published on August 2, 2022, at Britannica's ProCon.org, a nonpartisan issue-information source.

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Some argue that parents and other adults should have the final say in what children read from schools and libraries because children should not be exposed to certain topics, while others argue that the books available to all children should not be restricted by a few parents who object to world-clarifying topics.

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https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/986/book-banning#:~:text=removal%20of%20books.-,Opponents%20of%20bans%20argue%20that%20by%20restricting%20information%20and%20discouraging,how%20to%20think%20for%20themselves.

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Book banning, the most widespread form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes. Those advocating a ban complain typically that the book in question contains graphic violence, expresses disrespect for parents and family, is sexually explicit, exalts evil, lacks literary merit, is unsuitable for a particular age group, or includes offensive language. In this photo, Gail Sheehy, author of "Passages," at podium, right, reads during the "First Banned Books Read Out" in New York, April 1, 1982. The rally protested censorship by school and public libraries of certain books under pressure from right wing religious groups. (AP Photo/Carlos Rene Perez, used with permission from the Associated Press)

Book banning, a form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes. Those advocating a ban complain typically that the book in question contains graphic violence, expresses disrespect for parents and family, is sexually explicit, exalts evil, lacks literary merit, is unsuitable for a particular age group, or includes offensive language.

Book banning is the most widespread form of censorship in the United States

Book banning is the most widespread form of censorship in the United States, with children's literature being the primary target. Advocates for banning a book or certain books fear that children will be swayed by its contents, which they regard as potentially dangerous. They commonly fear that these publications will present ideas, raise questions, and incite critical inquiry among children that parents, political groups, or religious organizations are not ready to address or that they find inappropriate.

Most challenges and bans prior to the 1970s focused primarily on obscenity and explicit sexuality. Common targets included D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterly's Lover and James Joyce's . In the late 1970s, attacks were launched on ideologies expressed in books.

To counter charges of censorship, opponents of publications sometimes use the tactic of restricting access rather than calling for the physical removal of books. Opponents of bans argue that by restricting information and discouraging freedom of thought, censors undermine one of the primary functions of education: teaching students how to think for themselves. Such actions, assert free speech proponents, endanger tolerance, free expression, and democracy. In this photo, author Kurt Vonnegut Jr., speaks to reporters on a federal court ruling calling for a trial to determine if a Long Island school board can ban a number of books, including his "Slaughterhouse Five," at New York Civil Liberty offices in 1980. (AP Photo-File, used with permission from the Associated Press)

In September 1990, the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression declared the First Amendment to be "in perilous condition across the nation" based on the results of a comprehensive survey on free expression. Even literary classics, including Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, were targeted. Often, the complaints arose from individual parents or school board members. At other times, however, the pressure to censor came from such public interest groups as the Moral Majority.

Censorship - the suppression of ideas and information - can occur at any stage or level of publication, distribution, or institutional control. Some pressure groups claim that the public funding of most schools and libraries makes community censorship of their holdings legitimate.

To counter charges of censorship, opponents of publications sometimes use the tactic of restricting access rather than calling for the physical removal of books. Opponents of bans argue that by restricting information and discouraging freedom of thought, censors undermine one of the primary functions of education: teaching students how to think for themselves. Such actions, assert free speech proponents, endanger tolerance, free expression, and democracy.

Community standards may be taken into account when deciding if materials are subject to censor

Although censorship violates the First Amendment right to freedom of speech, some limitations are constitutionally permissible. The courts have told public officials at all levels that they may take community standards into account when deciding whether materials are obscene or pornographic and thus subject to censor.

They cannot, however, censor publications by generally accepted authors - such as Mark Twain, for example, J. K. Rowling, R. L. Stine, Judy Blume, or Robert Cormier - in order to placate a small segment of the community. Cormier's Chocolate War was one of the American Library Association's Top 10 Banned Books for 2005 and 2006.

Those who oppose book banning emphasize that the First Amendment protects students' rights to receive and express ideas. The Supreme Court in Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico (1982) ruled 5-4 that public schools can bar books that are "pervasively vulgar" or not right for the curriculum, but they cannot remove books "simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books." The Court's decision was, however, narrow, applying only to the removal of books from school library shelves. In this photo, Makenzie Hatfield a student at George Washington high school, holds banned books by author Pat Conroy in West Virginia in 2007. The Pat Conroy books "Beach Music" and "The Prince of Tides" were suspended from nearby Nitro High School English classes after parents of two students complained about depictions of violence, suicide and sexual assault. Conroy defended the books in an e-mail reply last month to Hatfield, who teamed with classmates and Nitro students to form a coalition against censorship. (AP Photo/Jeff Gentner, used with permission from the Associated Press)

Opponents of book banning emphasize the First Amendment rights of students

Those who oppose book banning emphasize that the First Amendment protects students' rights to receive and express ideas. The Supreme Court in Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico (1982) ruled 5-4 that public schools can bar books that are "pervasively vulgar" or not right for the curriculum, but they cannot remove books "simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books." The Court's decision was, however, narrow, applying only to the removal of books from school library shelves.

The American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom documents censorship incidents around the country and suggests strategies for dealing with them. Each September, the American Library Association, the American Booksellers Association, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Association of American Publishers, and the National Association of College Stores sponsor Banned Books Week - Celebrating the Freedom to Read.

Designed to "emphasize that imposing information restraints on a free people is far more dangerous than any ideas that may be expressed in that information," the week highlights banned works, encourages citizens to explore new ideas, and provides a variety of materials to promote free speech events.

The American Library Association publishes the bimonthly Newsletter on Intellectual Freedom, which provides information on censorship, as well as an annual annotated list of books and other materials that have been censored.
This article was originally published in 2009. Susan Webb is an Adjunct Librarian at Southeastern Oklahoma State University.
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Book banning, the most widespread form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes.

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https://pen.org/report/banned-usa-growing-movement-to-censor-books-in-schools/

This article talks about how many Americans want to control the curriculum but banning books not only their children can read but also the general public.It provides data to show the percentages of people but also what kind of books are trying to be banned the most.It also talks about how the movement is extremely undemocratic and violates the first amendment.

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The Most Frequently Banned Authors

The most banned authors include winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature, the National Book Award for Young People's Literature, the Booker Prize, the Newbery Award, the Caldecott Medal, the Eisner Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the NAACP Image Award, the GLAAD Award for Media Representation, the Stonewall Award, and more.

Hopkins, Ellen - 14 titles - 43 bans - 20 districts

Kobabe, Maia - 1 title - 41 bans - 41 districts

Morrison, Toni - 3 titles - 34 bans - 25 districts

Johnson, George M. - 2 titles - 30 bans - 29 districts

Myracle, Lauren - 11 titles - 30 bans - 16 districts

Pérez, Ashley Hope - 1 title - 23 bans - 23 districts

Thomas, Angie - 2 titles - 19 bans - 17 districts

Silvera, Adam - 9 titles - 18 bans - 13 districts

Reynolds, Jason - 6 titles - 18 bans - 11 districts

Maas, Sarah J. - 8 titles - 18 bans - 10 districts

Levithan, David - 15 titles - 17 bans - 18 districts

Alexie, Sherman - 2 titles - 17 bans - 17 districts

Evison, Jonathan - 1 title - 17 bans - 17 districts

Andrews, Jesse - 2 titles - 17 bans - 16 districts

Faruqi, Saadia - 17 titles - 17 bans - 2 districts

Jules, Jacqueline - 17 titles - 17 bans - 2 districts

Do, Anh - 17 titles - 17 bans - 1 district

Green, John - 3 titles - 16 bans - 15 districts

Atwood, Margaret - 3 titles - 15 bans - 11 districts

Hutchinson, Shaun David - 6 titles - 15 bans - 7 districts

Albertalli, Becky - 7 titles - 14 bans - 11 districts

Miedoso, Andrés - 14 titles - 14 bans - 1 district

Gino, Alex - 2 titles - 13 bans - 11 districts

Woodson, Jacqueline - 11 titles - 13 bans - 6 districts

Asher, Jay - 1 title - 12 bans - 12 districts

Hosseini, Khaled - 1 title - 12 bans - 12 districts

Dawson, Juno - 2 titles - 12 bans - 11 districts

Tamaki, Mariko - 2 titles - 12 bans - 11 districts

Picoult, Jodi - 3 titles - 12 bans - 10 districts

Glines, Abbi - 9 titles - 12 bans - 5 districts

Peters, Julie Anne - 8 titles - 12 bans - 4 districts

Cast, Kristen - 12 titles - 12 bans - 1 district

Cast, P. C. - 12 titles - 12 bans - 1 district

Kuklin, Susan - 1 title - 11 bans - 11 districts

Telgemeier, Raina - 1 title - 11 bans - 11 districts

Jennings, Jazz - 2 titles - 11 bans - 10 districts

Stone, Nic - 3 titles - 11 bans - 10 districts

Lockhart, E. - 3 titles - 11 bans - 8 districts

Brown, Monica - 10 titles - 11 bans - 2 districts

Kendi, Ibram X. - 7 titles - 10 bans - 12 districts

Anderson, Laurie Halse - 3 titles - 10 bans - 10 districts

Curato, Mike - 1 title - 10 bans - 10 districts

Rosen, L. C. - 1 title - 10 bans - 10 districts

Clare, Cassandra - 5 titles - 10 bans - 8 districts

Arnold, Elana K. - 7 titles - 10 bans - 5 districts

Konigsberg, Bill - 5 titles - 10 bans - 5 districts

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Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Ban Books - PEN America

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PEN America's report on school book bans offers the most comprehensive look at banned books in the 2021-22 school year, with counting more than 2,500 bans.

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https://qz.com/book-bans-are-spiking-in-the-us-here-are-the-most-targ-1849565948
This article talks about the book bans and the most common names that are associated with the bans. It also gives us a graph of how much censorship there has been in the past years. It also gives us an indication of the amount of censorship there is in each state some are very minimal and some are drastic amounts.

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The number of book bans in US schools and libraries has more than doubled from last year, according to the latest tally from the American Library Association (ALA).

This week, ALA is holding its annual Banned Books Week, from September 18-24, to advocate for open access to information. While in the past bans usually targeted one book at a time, advocacy groups are now going after multiple titles at once,according to the association.

So far this year, ALA has tracked efforts to ban or restrict 1,651 titles, up from 729 in all of 2021. It's the highest annual number since it started collecting data years ago.

Where are books banned?

Book bans are popping up across the country, with documented restrictions in at least 32 states. A state-by-state shows Texas and Florida have banned the most books, according to PEN America, a non-profit that advocates for freedom of expression.

The bans are mostly driven by right-wing political groups, such as Moms for Liberty and No Left Turn in Education. But left-leaning organizations, like We Need Diverse Books and Disrupt Texts, have also sought to remove or revise books taught in K-12 schools.

The majority of banned titles are authored by or about members of the LGBTQ and Black communities. Most banned books include content on race, racism, and sex.

Which books are banned the most?

The 2022 book ban list includes titles that have been restricted in previous years. They include The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, and The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. But there are also some new additions: Gender Queerby Maia Kobabe and Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Perez.

Take a look at the most targeted books over the past three years:

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the absolutely true diary of a part-time indian

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Book bans are spiking in the US. Here are the most targeted titles

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The number of book bans in US schools and libraries has more than doubled from last year, according to the latest tally from the American Library Association (ALA). This week, ALA is holding its annual Banned Books Week, from September 18-24, to advocate for open access to information.

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This article talks about why book bans are harmful for the education system. It also talks about children being uninformed about certain topics such as racism and how the uninformed ones are the ones who aren't affected by the issue.

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Secondary schools that ban books often justify the censorship of students' reading materials by framing it as a matter of protection. Parents and school boards alike argue that middle and high school students are too young and immature to handle descriptions of violence, sex, and war in literature.

There is definitely an extent to which certain topics are inappropriate for children. Nevertheless, restricting access to diverse voices and vital historical information for the sake of preserving innocence is unacceptable. This is especially true when an overwhelming number banned books do not contain egregious content and happen to be written by marginalized authors.

According to The New York Times, recent bans include Art Spiegelman's graphic novel "Maus," Toni Morrison's novel "The Bluest Eye," John M. Johnson's memoir "All Boys Aren't Blue," and Maia Kobabe's memoir "Gender Queer."

These titles fall into an alarming pattern. Many are critically acclaimed, and all were written by authors who represent marginalized communities. They tell stories of oppression, persecution, and racism; tackle topics related to gender and sexuality; and highlight past injustices.

When these topics are made inaccessible, students are prevented from exploring identity, learning about history, and discovering community.

According to The New York Times, the practice of book banning is occurring at an alarming rate and is becoming increasingly politicized.

"Conservative groups in particular, fueled by social media, are now pushing the [book] challenges into statehouses, law enforcement, and political races," The New York Times' Elizabeth Harris and Alexandra Alter said.

Banning books on the basis of political controversy only fosters ignorance and isolation. Students who are unaffected by issues like racism will remain uninformed about them. Meanwhile, marginalized students will remain ostracized from their more privileged peers as schools display an unwillingness to foster inclusivity in the classroom and tell their stories.

Additionally, if the perceived contentiousness of a book's subject allows it to be struck from reading lists, students will be left unaware of past and present realities that - though harsh - likely affect themselves or their peers.

According to NBC, a predominantly white Pennsylvania school recently banned an array of instructional materials about race - including the documentary "I Am Not Your Negro," the film "Hidden Figures," and the book "I Am Rosa Parks."

Racism is still prevalent and students of color are deeply affected by it. Despite its historical and present relevancy, literature about it continues to be banned.

"Children, especially children of color and those who are members of ethnic minorities, were not sheltered or spared from [historical] horrors when they happened," The Atlantic's Marilisa Jiménez Garcia said. "What's more, the sanitization of history in the name of shielding children assumes, incorrectly, that today's students are untouched by oppression, imprisonment, death, or racial and ethnic profiling."

Many books are banned because their subject matter is believed to be contentious or harmful to students. "Maus," Lois Lowry's "Number the Stars," and Anne Frank's "Diary of a Young Girl" - which are all about Jewish people's experiences during the Holocaust - are among this number.

At the same time that these books are being characterized as detrimental to students on the basis of divisiveness, some schools are pushing for the presentation of alternative perspectives on topics - including the Holocaust - in the classroom.

"In October, a Texas school-district administrator invoked a law...instructing teachers to present opposing views about the Holocaust in their classrooms," Garcia said.

This reveals that America's schools are dangerously willing to silence minority voices in favor of the voices of oppressors. It seems that comfort is more important than reality for a significant number of parents and school board officials.

By eliminating certain perspectives from students' literary repertoire, we are sanitizing our history and curating a dangerously heteronormative, white-dominated narrative for student consumption. Students deserve access to those inclusive and representative texts.
Photo Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Featured Photo Caption: Banning books prevents students from accessing important voices and community discourse.

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Banning books in schools is a harmful, exclusionary practice – The Elm

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This article gives us percentages of the banned books, saying how many were because of organization, and facts about the banned books. The article tells us that "96 percent of the bans did not follow the best practice guidelines for book challenges... 41 percent of the banned titles explicitly address LGBTQ themes... 21 percent directly address race and racism... 40 percent feature major characters of color...[and] 22 percent have sexual themes... organizations are compiling lists of books, without necessarily reading or even looking at them." As we can see, most of these books seem like they have been targeted. Furthermore, these organizations don't even read the books they advocate banning.

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It's Banned Books Week, an annual campaign that began in 1982 to celebrate the First Amendment and encourage the protection of controversial materials. But now, four decades later, book bans are on the rise, according to a new report from the free speech nonprofit PEN America.

Between July 2021 and June 2022, the report-Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Censor Books in Schools-found 2,532 instances of individual bans, which covered 1,648 unique books. PEN America tracks the bans in a public spreadsheet, which indicates that the most-banned book is Maia Kobabe's Gender Queer: A Memoir.

The bans took place in 138 school districts across 32 states; in total, those school districts enroll nearly 4 million students. (These numbers only account for the bans that PEN America was able to track, and the organization says that more likely exist.) The report found that 96 percent of the bans did not follow the best practice guidelines for book challenges outlined by the American Library Association (ALA) and the National Coalition Against Censorship.

About 41 percent of the banned titles explicitly address LGBTQ themes, making these the biggest target of the bans. Books involving sexual content-such as stories about teen pregnancy, sexual assault and abortion-account for 22 percent of the titles. About 21 percent directly address race and racism, while 40 percent feature major characters of color.

The team behind Banned in the USA wanted to determine where book bans originated. They found that in many instances, the bans were the calculated result of work by advocacy groups.

"[T]he large majority of book bans underway today are not spontaneous, organic expressions of citizen concern," the report states. "Rather, they reflect the work of a growing number of advocacy organizations that have made demanding censorship of certain books and ideas in schools part of their mission."

PEN America identified 50 groups, some with hundreds of regional chapters, pushing for book bans across the country. The majority of those groups-73 percent-have formed since 2021.

"These groups probably do not necessarily represent a range of beliefs from our democracy," PEN America's Jonathan Friedman, one of the report's authors, tells Education Week's Eesha Pendharkar. "So they're having an outsized impact in a lot of places on what it is that everybody gets to read."

Such groups have played a hand in many of the book bans that took place over the last school year; 20 percent of bans can be directly linked to their work, while they appear to have influenced an additional 30 percent.

"This is a concerted, organized, well-resourced push at censorship," Suzanne Nossel, the chief executive of PEN America, tells the New York Times' Elizabeth A. Harris. "[The effort] is ideologically motivated and politically expedient, and it needs to be understood as such in order to be confronted and addressed properly."

Last week, the ALA released its own report, which examines book bans since the beginning of 2022, and found a similar increase in bans.

"I've never seen anything like this," Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom, tells Hillel Italie of the Associated Press (AP). "It's both the number of challenges and the kinds of challenges. It used to be a parent had learned about a given book and had an issue with it. Now we see campaigns where organizations are compiling lists of books, without necessarily reading or even looking at them."

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Over 1,600 Books Were Banned During the Past School Year

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A new PEN America report finds that targeted campaigns by advocacy groups are behind the increasing bans

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https://www.cbsnews.com/news/banned-books-list-increased-schools-ban-critical-race-theory-sexuality-pen-america-report/

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The number of books banned in American school districts is increasing, a new report by PEN America has found. Between July 2021 and June 2022, books were banned 2,532 times in public schools across the U.S., according to the nonprofit, which works to defend free expression.

PEN American says 1,648 unique book titles were banned in that period. Between July 2021 and March 2022, PEN tracked 1,586 book bans. Since that report was published in April, 275 more book bans were recorded between April and June 2022.

Many books - 41% - that were banned included LGBTQ themes, protagonists or prominent secondary characters. A whopping 40% that were banned included people of color. Books with issues of race and racism (21%) and books with themes of rights and activism (10%) were also among those banned. About 22% of the books that were banned had sexual content. Biographies, autobiographies and stories about religious minorities are also on the list of banned books.

There are several reasons why books may be banned from schools and libraries. Last year, dozens of Republican state lawmakers introduced bills that would ban content they deemed offensive in schools.

PEN America estimates that at least 40% of book bans are connected to either legislation "or to political pressure exerted by state officials or elected lawmakers to restrict the teaching or presence of certain books or concepts."

PEN America has also identified at least 50 groups, many of which have local or regional chapters, that they say have played a role in at least 50% of the book bans enacted across the country during the 2021-2022 school year.

Under legislation that targets content with themes of race and sexuality, and campaigns by members of the public, schools may feel pressure to remove books from their classrooms and libraries.

American Library Association (ALA) keeps a record of frequently banned books and some titles are extremely popular - like the "Harry Potter" series, which was on the top 10 most frequently banned books list in 2019. This series was banned for "referring to magic and witchcraft, for containing actual curses and spells, and for characters that use 'nefarious means' to attain goals," according to the ALA.

Most books, however, are banned because they include themes about race or sexuality.

Some states ban books that include themes about race by using the term "critical race theory" in their legislation. Critical race theory is most often taught at the college or law school levels and acknowledges racial disparities have persisted in U.S. history and are reinforced in U.S. law and institutions.

While there is no evidence that critical race theory is taught in K-12 schools, it is often used as a catch-all term in states' legislation - including Texas' - as a way to limit discussions about race in the classroom.

Books that include themes of sexuality, like "Gender Queer," are often deemed "obscene" and "pornographic" by people who want to ban them, PEN America said in its report.

"Gender Queer," the most frequently-banned book, according to PEN America, is written by Maia Kobabe and is described by its publisher as a "useful and touching guide on gender identity."

Deborah Stone, director of the ALA's office for intellectual freedom, told CBS News last year that books "that reflect the lives of LGBTQIA persons and families" provide important representation.

"You might not be the audience, your child might not be the audience, but more often than not, there is an audience for the books and often they are desperately needed," she said.

PEN America said there is evidence that the effort to ban books is continuing in the 2022-2023 school year - at least 139 additional bans have taken effect since July 2022.

"This movement to ban books is deeply undemocratic, in that it often seeks to impose restrictions on all students and families based on the preferences of those calling for the bans and notwithstanding polls that consistently show that Americans of all political persuasions oppose book bans," PEN America said, citing a CBS News poll that found more than 8 in 10 Americans don't think books should be banned from schools for discussing race and criticizing U.S. history, for depicting slavery in the past, or, more broadly for political ideas they disagree with.

Trending News

Caitlin O'Kane

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Over 1,600 books were banned in U.S. school districts in one year - and the number is increasing

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The number of books banned in American school districts is increasing, a new report by PEN America has found. Between July 2021 and June 2022, books were banned 2,532 times in public schools across the U.S., according to the nonprofit, which works to defend free expression.

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https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/07/us/book-bans-school-changes-reaj/index.html

The article talks about the book bans and how it has started a debate surrounding gender and race in classrooms.

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It's been only a few weeks since millions of children returned to America's schools - but the debate surrounding the teaching of gender identity and race is already at a fever pitch.

Dozens of books have been pulled from shelves in Texas, new policies expanding oversight of books are being drafted or already passed in multiple states, a Florida school district halted library purchases and a teacher resigned in Oklahoma over the censorship of books in classroom libraries.

With new laws that restrict teaching about race, history and gender identity in effect in more than a dozen states, students are starting to see changes in the classroom and more might be coming in the next months.

In a recent analysis, the literary and free expression advocacy organization PEN America found that 19 states have laws targeting discussions of race, gender, and United States history; and 36 other states introduced 137 similar bills in 2022, marking a significant increase compared to the 54 bills proposed last year.

"For teachers and for students, what this amounts to is an escalating campaign of censorship. A dramatically increased chilling effect that is leading to all kinds of negative outcomes within the classroom," said Jeremy Young, senior manager of free expression and education at PEN America who has been tracking censorship in US classrooms.

Young said those laws have so far impacted classrooms in multiple ways. They have led to teachers not bringing up topics that could be considered controversial to avoid trouble, curriculum and school policy changes, and books being banned from schools.

In Missouri, school librarians have been reviewing books available on campus for potential removal to comply with a new law that makes it a crime to give students books that contain sexually explicit material. If school employees violate the state law, they could be charged with a class A misdemeanor, which carries a maximum penalty of one year in jail and a fine of $2,000.

Meanwhile in Texas, the recent book removals have been linked more broadly to the ongoing efforts by community members rather than a direct response to legislative changes.

Kate Huddleston, an attorney with the ACLU of Texas, said there has been an alarming trend of school districts pulling books off shelves in recent months.

Backed by conservative lawmakers, the state's "critical race theory" law took effect in December and prohibits teachers from discussing "a widely debated and currently controversial issue of public policy or social affairs." There have not been many policies put in place implementing the state law, Huddleston said, but some schools are taking action to decide what books and reading materials students should have access to.

Many of those actions are book bans and generally target the history of racism, racial inclusion, gender identity and LGBTQ+ inclusion, she added.

"Districts are targeting books based on the ideas that they contain, and keeping those books off the shelves violates the First Amendment and violates student's rights to access a range of ideas," said Huddleston who added that the ACLU of Texas has been sending letters to school officials that include an analysis of how they are not complying with federal law.

One of those school districts was the Keller Independent School District in North Texas where a day before students returned to school last month, an administrator asked principals and librarians to temporarily remove more than 40 books from shelves on campus, Bryce Nieman, director of communications and legislative affairs at Keller ISD told CNN.

The books, including all versions of the Bible and a graphic novel adaptation of Anne Frank's diary, were challenged by parents and community members in the past year but had to be reviewed once again under a new set of standards recently approved by the district's board of trustees, school officials said.

"If the books pass the new standards, as determined by reviews conducted in coordination with campus administration and librarians, the books will be promptly returned to shelves," Keller ISD Superintendent Rick Westfall said in a message to district families and employees.

A list of books posted on the district's website indicates the Anne Frank's diary adaption and all versions of The Bible have already been returned to circulation. The review of the rest of the books is ongoing, district officials said.

Keller ISD is also an example of how heated disputes at school board meetings are evolving in some places.

For more than a year, the meetings have been home to protests and long hours of public comments on diversity and equity plans, critical race theory and students' access to "inappropriate content." Complaints about certain books, including "All Boys Aren't Blue" by George M. Johnson often led to school officials ordering their removal. In many cases doing so meant not following existing policies or a formal process, according to an analysis of school book bans released by PEN America earlier this year.

Keller ISD and some other districts recently drafted and passed policies that give parents and trustees more oversight of what students read, and set in place strict review processes for the selection of library books. Young, the senior manager at PEN America, said nearly a dozen school districts in the past few weeks have changed their policies to make it easier to ban books based on their content.

In other school districts, the push to remove books including those exploring LGBTQ themes about sexuality and gender identity by community members with conservative views has not stopped - even in places where school officials have reviewed and made decisions on challenged books.

At a board meeting of the Granbury Independent School District last month, several people spoke during the public comment section asking for more books to be permanently removed from shelves and describing them as "inappropriate" or with the ability to damage students' brains. Earlier this year, a district committee reviewed books challenged and voted to remove only a handful of titles.

Teachers, parents and school librarians are pushing back

Frustration over the new restricting laws, continued complains by conservative residents and even alleged harassment have pushed teachers, parents and school librarians to take action.

In Oklahoma, an English teacher said she resigned from her job following controversy over the display of, and student access to, more than 500 books in her classroom library.

When teachers in the Norman Public Schools were asked to review books to see which might "elicit challenges" related to the new state law, teacher Summer Boismier says she decided to cover the books, labeled them with "Books the State Doesn't Want You to Read," and put up the QR code.

She was placed on administrative leave, Boismier says, but the district has denied it.

"It's my desire and the top objective that I have as an educator, to make my classroom as inclusive as possible," she told CNN last month.

The Louisiana Association of School Librarians has been urging members to stand up against censorship if they feel comfortable doing so. Amanda Jones, president of the organization and a middle school librarian in Livingston Parish, said members want to inform community members about public policies on school libraries and educate them on the job they do because there is confusion.

"These fringe groups capitalize on that lack of knowledge from everyday citizens, and they use rhetoric, like pornography and erotica to describe books, especially books around LGBTQ+ themes and sexual health books that written by experts like the American Psychological Association," Jones told CNN. "They are not interested in the truth."

Jones said school librarians can speak out at school board meetings and write letters to city and state lawmakers, but they do have to "weigh personal safety" because "you can be attacked and have completely fabricated stories told about you."

"We don't want to use the same hateful rhetoric that these people use against us," Jones said. "We want to make sure we're positive and we're promoting the library in a positive light."

She recently filed a lawsuit asking authorities to issue a temporary restraining order against a group she says has been harassing her since she made a "blanket" speech about censorship at the Livingston Parish Public Library Board of Control in July. The case is ongoing.

Meanwhile in Texas, Adrienne Martin, a Granbury parent and chair of the Hood County Democratic Party, told CNN she recently started speaking at the board meetings after seeing the same group of individuals who are not parents of children attending the district's schools complaining at the meetings.

"So, being a taxpayer does not grant special privileges over students, staff, and parents. I do not want random people with no education background or experience determining what books my child can read, what curriculum they learn, and what clubs they can join," Martin said during the last board meeting.

"Just because you can get up at every meeting and rant and rave does not give you authority over my child's education," she added.

In response to book banning and censorship, a number of groups have launched online tools and initiatives to support students, including the American Library Association. Last week, the ACLU of Texas launched a resources hub to help students, educators, and advocates learn how to protect their rights.

"It's really critical in this time that not just the ACLU, but people throughout the nation stand up for the rights of all students to learn and have access to a wide range of ideas, particularly those related to historically oppressed communities," said Huddleston.

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School just started but the debate surrounding gender and race in classrooms is already at a fever pitch | CNN

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It's been only a few weeks since millions of children returned to America's schools - but the debate surrounding the teaching of gender identity and race is already at a fever pitch.

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https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/whos-behind-the-push-to-ban-books-in-schools-180980818/

This article contains percentages of the amount of people who believe these books should be banned. It contains information to why they may believe people should ban books. This shows how it may affect things.

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It's Banned Books Week, an annual campaign that began in 1982 to celebrate the First Amendment and encourage the protection of controversial materials. But now, four decades later, book bans are on the rise, according to a new report from the free speech nonprofit PEN America.

Between July 2021 and June 2022, the report-Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Censor Books in Schools-found 2,532 instances of individual bans, which covered 1,648 unique books. PEN America tracks the bans in a public spreadsheet, which indicates that the most-banned book is Maia Kobabe's Gender Queer: A Memoir.

The bans took place in 138 school districts across 32 states; in total, those school districts enroll nearly 4 million students. (These numbers only account for the bans that PEN America was able to track, and the organization says that more likely exist.) The report found that 96 percent of the bans did not follow the best practice guidelines for book challenges outlined by the American Library Association (ALA) and the National Coalition Against Censorship.

About 41 percent of the banned titles explicitly address LGBTQ themes, making these the biggest target of the bans. Books involving sexual content-such as stories about teen pregnancy, sexual assault and abortion-account for 22 percent of the titles. About 21 percent directly address race and racism, while 40 percent feature major characters of color.

The team behind Banned in the USA wanted to determine where book bans originated. They found that in many instances, the bans were the calculated result of work by advocacy groups.

"[T]he large majority of book bans underway today are not spontaneous, organic expressions of citizen concern," the report states. "Rather, they reflect the work of a growing number of advocacy organizations that have made demanding censorship of certain books and ideas in schools part of their mission."

PEN America identified 50 groups, some with hundreds of regional chapters, pushing for book bans across the country. The majority of those groups-73 percent-have formed since 2021.

"These groups probably do not necessarily represent a range of beliefs from our democracy," PEN America's Jonathan Friedman, one of the report's authors, tells Education Week's Eesha Pendharkar. "So they're having an outsized impact in a lot of places on what it is that everybody gets to read."

Such groups have played a hand in many of the book bans that took place over the last school year; 20 percent of bans can be directly linked to their work, while they appear to have influenced an additional 30 percent.

"This is a concerted, organized, well-resourced push at censorship," Suzanne Nossel, the chief executive of PEN America, tells the New York Times' Elizabeth A. Harris. "[The effort] is ideologically motivated and politically expedient, and it needs to be understood as such in order to be confronted and addressed properly."

Last week, the ALA released its own report, which examines book bans since the beginning of 2022, and found a similar increase in bans.

"I've never seen anything like this," Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom, tells Hillel Italie of the Associated Press (AP). "It's both the number of challenges and the kinds of challenges. It used to be a parent had learned about a given book and had an issue with it. Now we see campaigns where organizations are compiling lists of books, without necessarily reading or even looking at them."

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Over 1,600 Books Were Banned During the Past School Year

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A new PEN America report finds that targeted campaigns by advocacy groups are behind the increasing bans

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This article talks about how banning books would go against your first amendment rights. Many times books are bands because of vulgar topics but you should have a choice to what you read. You don't have to read it but it should be available to you.

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Book banning, the most widespread form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes. Those advocating a ban complain typically that the book in question contains graphic violence, expresses disrespect for parents and family, is sexually explicit, exalts evil, lacks literary merit, is unsuitable for a particular age group, or includes offensive language. In this photo, Gail Sheehy, author of "Passages," at podium, right, reads during the "First Banned Books Read Out" in New York, April 1, 1982. The rally protested censorship by school and public libraries of certain books under pressure from right wing religious groups. (AP Photo/Carlos Rene Perez, used with permission from the Associated Press)

Book banning, a form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes. Those advocating a ban complain typically that the book in question contains graphic violence, expresses disrespect for parents and family, is sexually explicit, exalts evil, lacks literary merit, is unsuitable for a particular age group, or includes offensive language.

Book banning is the most widespread form of censorship in the United States

Book banning is the most widespread form of censorship in the United States, with children's literature being the primary target. Advocates for banning a book or certain books fear that children will be swayed by its contents, which they regard as potentially dangerous. They commonly fear that these publications will present ideas, raise questions, and incite critical inquiry among children that parents, political groups, or religious organizations are not ready to address or that they find inappropriate.

Most challenges and bans prior to the 1970s focused primarily on obscenity and explicit sexuality. Common targets included D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterly's Lover and James Joyce's . In the late 1970s, attacks were launched on ideologies expressed in books.

To counter charges of censorship, opponents of publications sometimes use the tactic of restricting access rather than calling for the physical removal of books. Opponents of bans argue that by restricting information and discouraging freedom of thought, censors undermine one of the primary functions of education: teaching students how to think for themselves. Such actions, assert free speech proponents, endanger tolerance, free expression, and democracy. In this photo, author Kurt Vonnegut Jr., speaks to reporters on a federal court ruling calling for a trial to determine if a Long Island school board can ban a number of books, including his "Slaughterhouse Five," at New York Civil Liberty offices in 1980. (AP Photo-File, used with permission from the Associated Press)

In September 1990, the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression declared the First Amendment to be "in perilous condition across the nation" based on the results of a comprehensive survey on free expression. Even literary classics, including Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, were targeted. Often, the complaints arose from individual parents or school board members. At other times, however, the pressure to censor came from such public interest groups as the Moral Majority.

Censorship - the suppression of ideas and information - can occur at any stage or level of publication, distribution, or institutional control. Some pressure groups claim that the public funding of most schools and libraries makes community censorship of their holdings legitimate.

To counter charges of censorship, opponents of publications sometimes use the tactic of restricting access rather than calling for the physical removal of books. Opponents of bans argue that by restricting information and discouraging freedom of thought, censors undermine one of the primary functions of education: teaching students how to think for themselves. Such actions, assert free speech proponents, endanger tolerance, free expression, and democracy.

Community standards may be taken into account when deciding if materials are subject to censor

Although censorship violates the First Amendment right to freedom of speech, some limitations are constitutionally permissible. The courts have told public officials at all levels that they may take community standards into account when deciding whether materials are obscene or pornographic and thus subject to censor.

They cannot, however, censor publications by generally accepted authors - such as Mark Twain, for example, J. K. Rowling, R. L. Stine, Judy Blume, or Robert Cormier - in order to placate a small segment of the community. Cormier's Chocolate War was one of the American Library Association's Top 10 Banned Books for 2005 and 2006.

Those who oppose book banning emphasize that the First Amendment protects students' rights to receive and express ideas. The Supreme Court in Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico (1982) ruled 5-4 that public schools can bar books that are "pervasively vulgar" or not right for the curriculum, but they cannot remove books "simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books." The Court's decision was, however, narrow, applying only to the removal of books from school library shelves. In this photo, Makenzie Hatfield a student at George Washington high school, holds banned books by author Pat Conroy in West Virginia in 2007. The Pat Conroy books "Beach Music" and "The Prince of Tides" were suspended from nearby Nitro High School English classes after parents of two students complained about depictions of violence, suicide and sexual assault. Conroy defended the books in an e-mail reply last month to Hatfield, who teamed with classmates and Nitro students to form a coalition against censorship. (AP Photo/Jeff Gentner, used with permission from the Associated Press)

Opponents of book banning emphasize the First Amendment rights of students

Those who oppose book banning emphasize that the First Amendment protects students' rights to receive and express ideas. The Supreme Court in Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico (1982) ruled 5-4 that public schools can bar books that are "pervasively vulgar" or not right for the curriculum, but they cannot remove books "simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books." The Court's decision was, however, narrow, applying only to the removal of books from school library shelves.

The American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom documents censorship incidents around the country and suggests strategies for dealing with them. Each September, the American Library Association, the American Booksellers Association, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Association of American Publishers, and the National Association of College Stores sponsor Banned Books Week - Celebrating the Freedom to Read.

Designed to "emphasize that imposing information restraints on a free people is far more dangerous than any ideas that may be expressed in that information," the week highlights banned works, encourages citizens to explore new ideas, and provides a variety of materials to promote free speech events.

The American Library Association publishes the bimonthly Newsletter on Intellectual Freedom, which provides information on censorship, as well as an annual annotated list of books and other materials that have been censored.
This article was originally published in 2009. Susan Webb is an Adjunct Librarian at Southeastern Oklahoma State University.
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Book banning, the most widespread form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/30/books/book-ban-us-schools.html

The article above covers why book bans are spreading across the U.S and their effects on the country. It also talks about how parents are angry at what their children are reading. It also shows how people that schools are banning books in general.

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Book Ban Efforts Spread Across the U.S. (Published 2022)

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Challenges to books about sexual and racial identity are nothing new in American schools, but the tactics and politicization are.

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There is something different about the recent wave of book banning. The issue of book censorship is evolving beyond the typical school board meeting. Should public libraries and bookstores be cautious this year? Here's everything you need to know about how book bans are affecting schools and libraries:
What is book banning?

Book banning has a long history in the United States. The earliest campaign to ban a work of literature can be traced back to Thomas Morton's "New English Canaan," in 1964, according to The Washington Post. Banning books meant for adults has become increasingly complex, but 19th-century obscenity laws opened the door for people to turn their attention to books made available to children.

PEN America, a literary and free expression rights organization, defines school book banning as "any action taken against a book based on its content and as a result of parent or community challenges, administrative decisions, or in response to direct or threatened action by lawmakers or other governmental officials."

The organization attributes the new wave of book bans to the increasing number of "educational gag orders" being passed across the country. According to PEN, 36 states have introduced 137 educational gag order bills. Though only seven states have passed such laws, the number of proposed bills is 250 percent higher than in 2021. Many of these gag orders address the inclusion of critical race theory and LGBTQ themes in school. They are being used to facilitate the censorship of books in classrooms and school libraries.

The number of books being challenged has reached an unprecedented high, per The American Library Association. Compared to the usual 300-500 annual book challenges they receive, the number of challenges clocked in at 729 complaints levied against 1,527 different books in 2021.

The organization says that most of the targeted books were by or about Black and L.G.B.T.Q. people. The list of top titles mentioned in the book challenges include " All Boys Aren't Blue," by George M. Johnson, " Out of Darkness," by Ashley Hope Pérez, and " The Hate U Give," by Angie Thomas.

What is different about the recent wave of book banning campaigns?

Though book banning is an old practice, several factors are contributing to the shocking growth of books being challenged recently. In the past, these debates took place in school board meetings as parents contested material they deemed inappropriate for their students. However, the question of censorship has become increasingly politicized and potentially punitive across the nation.

One reason for the increasing political pressure around the issue is that parents are creating a national network to give each other tips on influencing the accessibility of books they deem harmful. Florida-based parental rights group Moms of Liberty has expanded to over 200 chapters nationwide. According to founder Tiffany Justice, their campaigns to monitor and challenge school reading lists are rooted in their desire to safeguard their children's innocence. Justice says "gender identity has no place being taught in schools," New York Times Magazine reports.

These groups are putting pressure on state officials to crack down on schools, teachers, and in some cases, public libraries. Conservative lawmakers are introducing more legislature like Florida's "Don't Say Gay" bill to create legal ramifications for introducing themes like gender identity and critical race theory in classrooms. These bills have become increasingly punitive, threatening educational institutions with being defunded, heavy fines, or criminal charges.

How are public schools handling book bans?

Over the past few weeks, the implementation of school book bans has begun as schools are back in session. Jeremy Young, senior manager of PEN America, told CNN that these measures had affected classrooms in multiple ways. Curriculum adjustments and school policy changes have included banning certain books. Many teachers are avoiding controversial topics altogether out of fear of criminal prosecution. CNN reports that schools in Texas are pulling books off the shelves, and one Florida school district put a moratorium on library purchases. At the same time, they're figuring out how to create school policies that reflect new censorship laws.

In other places, students and teachers are fighting back. A teacher in Oklahoma resigned, citing book censorship in classroom libraries as the catalyst. The Lousiana Association of School Librarians has petitioned its members to take a stand against censorship. Texas parent and chair of the Hood County Democratic Party, Adrienne Martin, has been speaking out against censorship in school board meetings. She said she was moved to do so after witnessing people who didn't have children at any of the district schools in question expressing their opinions. At a recent meeting, Martin said, "So, being a taxpayer does not grant special privileges over students, staff, and parents. I do not want random people with no education background or experience determining what books my child can read, what curriculum they learn, and what clubs they can join," per CNN.

Is the resurgence of book banning campaigns threatening public libraries?

Most censorship laws specifically target K-12 classrooms and higher education, but some states are contemplating expanding the bans to public libraries. While school libraries are directly addressed in most new regulations, the public library has primarily been protected because it is a public space protected by First Amendment rights. However, the broad language in many educational gag orders empowers parents and politicians to pressure public libraries to comply with their desire for censorship.

Time Magazine reports that public librarians in many states face the same pressure as their school counterparts. The director of library services for Victoria, Texas, Dayna Williams-Capone, says last year was the first time in her 25-year career that she was asked to remove certain books from the public collections. Residents elevated their concerns to the county commission when her team decided the books under review should stay. Though the county doesn't fund the library, it owns the building it is housed in. Commissioner Clint Ives was alarmed by books he deemed "pornographic" and has given the library 90 days to remove the books or face eviction.

With public libraries under scrutiny, some conservative citizens are also eyeing bookstores. In August, a judge in Virginia dismissed two petitions to ban Barnes & Noble and independent bookstores from selling two books to minors. The two petitions from Republican politicians targeted the books " Gender Queer" by Maia Kobabe and "A Court of Mist and Fury" by Sarah J. Maas, stating that they violated the state's obscenity law. The judge found that they lacked evidence proving the books were obscene and added that the state's obscenity laws were unconstitutional because they violated the First Amendment.

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How book bans are affecting schools and libraries

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There is something different about the recent wave of book banning. The issue of book censorship is evolving beyond the typical school board meeting. Should public libraries and bookstores be cautious this year? Here's everything you need to know about how book bans are affecting schools and libraries: Book banning has a long history in the United States.

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https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/986/book-banning

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Book banning, the most widespread form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes. Those advocating a ban complain typically that the book in question contains graphic violence, expresses disrespect for parents and family, is sexually explicit, exalts evil, lacks literary merit, is unsuitable for a particular age group, or includes offensive language. In this photo, Gail Sheehy, author of "Passages," at podium, right, reads during the "First Banned Books Read Out" in New York, April 1, 1982. The rally protested censorship by school and public libraries of certain books under pressure from right wing religious groups. (AP Photo/Carlos Rene Perez, used with permission from the Associated Press)

Book banning, a form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes. Those advocating a ban complain typically that the book in question contains graphic violence, expresses disrespect for parents and family, is sexually explicit, exalts evil, lacks literary merit, is unsuitable for a particular age group, or includes offensive language.

Book banning is the most widespread form of censorship in the United States

Book banning is the most widespread form of censorship in the United States, with children's literature being the primary target. Advocates for banning a book or certain books fear that children will be swayed by its contents, which they regard as potentially dangerous. They commonly fear that these publications will present ideas, raise questions, and incite critical inquiry among children that parents, political groups, or religious organizations are not ready to address or that they find inappropriate.

Most challenges and bans prior to the 1970s focused primarily on obscenity and explicit sexuality. Common targets included D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterly's Lover and James Joyce's . In the late 1970s, attacks were launched on ideologies expressed in books.

To counter charges of censorship, opponents of publications sometimes use the tactic of restricting access rather than calling for the physical removal of books. Opponents of bans argue that by restricting information and discouraging freedom of thought, censors undermine one of the primary functions of education: teaching students how to think for themselves. Such actions, assert free speech proponents, endanger tolerance, free expression, and democracy. In this photo, author Kurt Vonnegut Jr., speaks to reporters on a federal court ruling calling for a trial to determine if a Long Island school board can ban a number of books, including his "Slaughterhouse Five," at New York Civil Liberty offices in 1980. (AP Photo-File, used with permission from the Associated Press)

In September 1990, the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression declared the First Amendment to be "in perilous condition across the nation" based on the results of a comprehensive survey on free expression. Even literary classics, including Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, were targeted. Often, the complaints arose from individual parents or school board members. At other times, however, the pressure to censor came from such public interest groups as the Moral Majority.

Censorship - the suppression of ideas and information - can occur at any stage or level of publication, distribution, or institutional control. Some pressure groups claim that the public funding of most schools and libraries makes community censorship of their holdings legitimate.

To counter charges of censorship, opponents of publications sometimes use the tactic of restricting access rather than calling for the physical removal of books. Opponents of bans argue that by restricting information and discouraging freedom of thought, censors undermine one of the primary functions of education: teaching students how to think for themselves. Such actions, assert free speech proponents, endanger tolerance, free expression, and democracy.

Community standards may be taken into account when deciding if materials are subject to censor

Although censorship violates the First Amendment right to freedom of speech, some limitations are constitutionally permissible. The courts have told public officials at all levels that they may take community standards into account when deciding whether materials are obscene or pornographic and thus subject to censor.

They cannot, however, censor publications by generally accepted authors - such as Mark Twain, for example, J. K. Rowling, R. L. Stine, Judy Blume, or Robert Cormier - in order to placate a small segment of the community. Cormier's Chocolate War was one of the American Library Association's Top 10 Banned Books for 2005 and 2006.

Those who oppose book banning emphasize that the First Amendment protects students' rights to receive and express ideas. The Supreme Court in Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico (1982) ruled 5-4 that public schools can bar books that are "pervasively vulgar" or not right for the curriculum, but they cannot remove books "simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books." The Court's decision was, however, narrow, applying only to the removal of books from school library shelves. In this photo, Makenzie Hatfield a student at George Washington high school, holds banned books by author Pat Conroy in West Virginia in 2007. The Pat Conroy books "Beach Music" and "The Prince of Tides" were suspended from nearby Nitro High School English classes after parents of two students complained about depictions of violence, suicide and sexual assault. Conroy defended the books in an e-mail reply last month to Hatfield, who teamed with classmates and Nitro students to form a coalition against censorship. (AP Photo/Jeff Gentner, used with permission from the Associated Press)

Opponents of book banning emphasize the First Amendment rights of students

Those who oppose book banning emphasize that the First Amendment protects students' rights to receive and express ideas. The Supreme Court in Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico (1982) ruled 5-4 that public schools can bar books that are "pervasively vulgar" or not right for the curriculum, but they cannot remove books "simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books." The Court's decision was, however, narrow, applying only to the removal of books from school library shelves.

The American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom documents censorship incidents around the country and suggests strategies for dealing with them. Each September, the American Library Association, the American Booksellers Association, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Association of American Publishers, and the National Association of College Stores sponsor Banned Books Week - Celebrating the Freedom to Read.

Designed to "emphasize that imposing information restraints on a free people is far more dangerous than any ideas that may be expressed in that information," the week highlights banned works, encourages citizens to explore new ideas, and provides a variety of materials to promote free speech events.

The American Library Association publishes the bimonthly Newsletter on Intellectual Freedom, which provides information on censorship, as well as an annual annotated list of books and other materials that have been censored.
This article was originally published in 2009. Susan Webb is an Adjunct Librarian at Southeastern Oklahoma State University.
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Book banning, the most widespread form of censorship, occurs when private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes.

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This article talks about the books you would mostly see to be banned and where they happen most frequently.

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Here we are again. On an almost annual basis, a firestorm surrounding the notion of books being banned reignites somewhere in America. The most frequent battlegrounds are public and school libraries, with the fields of engagement including venues like school board meetings and town halls. Such a recurring cycle poses two questions: what are the most frequently banned or challenged books in the United States, and why?

The leading authority on tracking book bans and challenges in the United States is the American Library Association. A non-profit founded in 1876, the ALA promotes libraries and library education; it's the oldest such group in the world. Some of the organization's guiding principles are articulated in both the Library Bill of Rights and the Freedom to Read Statement. The LBR was drafted in 1939 and includes, in its third article, a stance against censorship. Freedom to Read was adopted in 1953 and lists as its first proposition: "It is in the public interest for publishers and librarians to make available the widest diversity of views and expressions, including those that are unorthodox, unpopular, or considered dangerous by the majority." The ALA is always in the forefront of advocacy to prevent bans, and they maintain databases and lists of challenged books (according to the ALA, "a challenge is an attempt to remove or restrict materials, based upon the objections of a person or group. A banning is the removal of those materials").When considering the question of which books have been challenged the most, it might be easier to ask, "What hasn't been challenged?" Here's a look at three categories: frequently challenged classics, the most challenged books of the 2000s, and the most challenged books of 2020 (the most recent year with complete data).

The Classics

The ALA uses the Columbia Publishing Course (formerly the Radcliffe Publishing Course) list of the Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century as the starting point for its "Banned and Challenged Classics" list. The Course (now based at Columbia University) is the most prestigious program of its kind, turning out many top editors in publishing. Near then end of the 1990s, the Course assembled a list of selections for top novels, and the ALA notes when any of those books have been challenged for bans. At present, 46 of the top 100 have been challenged or protested at public or school libraries.

In a January 28, 2022, thread on Twitter, Carnegie Mellon Professor Kathy M. Newman, who teaches a course on banned books, wrote, "Book banning in the United States happens the most frequently in five places: classrooms, schools, school districts, school boards, and public libraries. Challenges to books are almost always brought by public school parents." The lists of reasons as to why books get challenged are long and varied, but frequent topics listed by the ALA include strong language, ethnic slurs, depictions of sex or sexuality, violence, or even "moral content." J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was burned "as satanic" outside Christ Community Church in Alamagordo, New Mexico in 2001 (incidentally, the same year that part one of the blockbuster film adaptation, The Fellowship of the Ring, was released).

Among the classics with the largest number of challenges are J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, Alice Walker's The Color Purple, George Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, William Golding's The Lord of the Flies, John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men, and Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five. Some authors, like Toni Morrison and Ernest Hemmingway, have had a number of their works challenged; for Morrison, The Bluest Eye, Beloved, and Song of Solomon appear frequently, while for Hemmingway it's For Whom the Bell Tolls, A Farewell to Arms, and The Sun Also Rises. While these books occasionally do get removed from libraries, they frequently survive based on long-time critical esteem, and public acknowledgement of their status. Occasionally, the challenges make it to court, and some judges are reluctant to remove works of long-established literary merit.

The 2000s

The Office of Intellectual Freedom at the ALA is the section that has documented the most banned and challenged books running for over 30 years. For the decade from 2010 to 2019, they compiled a top 100 accounting that runs from the familiar ( 1984, Lolita) to the perhaps hilariously obvious ( Go the F- to Sleep by Adam Mansbach). It's notable that this list is for all libraries, and not just school libraries, hence the appearance of books like Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James. However, the top spot on the list is occupied by a frequently taught, frequently challenged book: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie. The book has been challenged for a laundry list of items, including slurs, violence, and sexual content; the book has also been challenged after accusations of sexual harassment against Alexie in 2018.

The following infographic demonstrates the nature of challenges from 1990-1999 and 2000-2009.

The Top 10, according to the ALA, are:

1. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

2. Captain Underpants (series) by Dav Pilkey

3. Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

4. Looking for Alaska by John Green

5. George by Alex Gino

6. And Tango Makes Three by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell

7. Drama by Raina Telgemeier

8. Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James

9. Internet Girls (series) by Lauren Myracle

10. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

2020

In 2020, the ALA reported that 273 books were challenged. And while some familiar entrants were on the list (hello again, Mr. Steinbeck and Ms. Morrison), topics that had been on the list prior to 2020 started making appearances. The Top Ten were:

1. George by Alex Gino

2. Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by and Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi

3. All American Boys by Jason Reynolds and Brendan Kiely

4. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

5. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

6. Something Happened in Our Town: A Child's Story About Racial Injustice by Marianne Celano, Marietta Collins, and Ann Hazzard

7. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

8. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

9. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

10. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

The following infographic shows, by size, the words and phrases that were used most often in more recent book challenges. Whereas in the past, depictions of sex or violence were responsible for reports, the majority of today's complaints are directed at LGBTQ+ content or characters (regardless of depictions of sex), religious viewpoint, political viewpoint, anti-racism stances, and anti-police rhetoric (though the frequently cited The Hate U Give deals with violence committed by police).

Emily Knox is an associate professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's School of Information Sciences; she's also the author of Book Banning in 21st Century America. In an interview with Yahoo! News from February 1, Knox elaborated on the changing motivations behind challenges. She said, "If you look at the ALA's list, you'll see that over the past five years, the list of most challenged books has [included] mostly what we call "diverse books." Knox cites the definition of "diverse" used by the non-profit We Need Diverse books, explaining that diverse titles are those "including (but not limited to) LGBTQIA, Native, people of color, gender diversity, people with disabilities, and ethnic, cultural, and religious minorities."

British daily newspaper The Guardian offers another wrinkle to the nature of book challenges in a January 24 piece by Adam Gabbatt titled, "US conservatives linked to rich donors wage campaign to ban books from schools." The article finds links between supposedly local "grass roots" groups and a larger networked effort that appears to be aiming to remove books from schools that contain LGBTQ+, Black, Latino, Indigenous, and Asian-American narratives.

One of the key groups involved is Parents Defending Education (PDE). According to the article, "PDE's president, Nicole Neily, was previously the executive director of the Independent Women's Forum and worked at the Cato Institute, a rightwing thinktank co-founded by Republican mega-donor Charles Koch." The article provides another link, noting, "[American non-profit news organization] The Intercept reported that the IWF has received large donations from Republican donor Leonard Leo, a former vice-president of the Koch-funded Federalist Society who advised Donald Trump on judicial appointments."

Charles Koch was a key figure in the Tea Party movement that sprang up in the wake of 2008's Great Recession. Koch and his brother, David, were involved with groups like Americans for Prosperity. In 2009, APF tied together a number of smaller groups into the broader Tea Party movement, providing central organization and funding. The playbook for Parents Defending Education is similar, as they offer templates that people can use to mount challenges to books, such as creating coordinated Instagram pages.

This creates situations where books about overcoming racism are reported for containing racist language, even in the context of the author telling the story of how certain words were used against them or their characters. Something Happened in Our Town: A Child's Story About Racial Injustice was reported for "divisive language" and being "anti-police" for dealing with topic of a racialized police shooting.

At this writing, the controversy around Maus, Art Spieglman's Pulizter Prize-winning graphic novel about the Holocaust, in particular continues to swirl. As the country moves into a contentious mid-term election season, it's a certainty that the book banning issue will continue to play a major part in the overall American narrative. The two main questions will be likely "Who writes that story?" and "Who gets to read it?"
Featured image: Shutterstock
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The Most Frequently Banned Books | The Saturday Evening Post

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Here we are again. On an almost annual basis, a firestorm surrounding the notion of books being banned reignites somewhere in America. The most frequent battlegrounds are public and school libraries, with the fields of engagement including venues like school board meetings and town halls.

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Book Banning, Curriculum Restrictions, and the Politicization of U.S. Schools

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State and local officials' efforts to undermine public education by playing politics with school curricula run against the interest of most American children and families.

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https://connectusfund.org/16-major-pros-and-cons-of-banning-books-in-schools

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16 Major Pros and Cons of Banning Books in Schools

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Banning books is one of the most common forms of censorship that exists in the world today. Banned Books Week began in 1982 to highlight the issues that surround this issue. Since the start of

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https://www.maryvillepawprint.com/the-negative-effects-of-book-banning-in-the-classroom/

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With an attempt to keep the innocence of children, book banning presents many negative effects for teachers, students, and classrooms. Book banning has a long history throughout the world. Books are continuously challenged and banned at local schools and libraries. When a book gets challenged or banned, someone else is trying to decide what is best for everyone based on his or her own beliefs and feelings. If they succeed, people can no longer access those books. When this happens, these individuals don't consider the negative effects it can have on students and teachers. For students, banning books means narrowing their world view. For teachers, it means an ever-changing curriculum and fear of personal choice. Book banning is one of the most common ways to censor education.

How Book Banning Impacts Students

Those who are affected the most by book banning are the students in the classroom. When books are banned or challenged, the footing of the curriculum becomes unstable. By opening children up to places, people, and different cultures, books help children develop empathy for others. By nature, children are very self-focused. It is hard for them to imagine different experiences and lives outside of their own. Books that show representation of different people and situations that are different from there's can teach them empathy. Books can also provide representation to children who come from marginalized communities. When you take these books away from students, it gives them a narrow way of looking at the world. Students will not be able to understand different cultures, worldviews, religions, etc., if individuals keep banning books that have these elements.

Banning books can stunt children's curiosity about the world and other people. College student Kerinna Kanters expresses why she thinks book banning has a negative effect on students. ''Removing books has a negative impact because it is censorship. When you censor certain ideas and beliefs, you create a more xenophobic and ignorant society. This is teaching students that it is okay to stop an idea or viewpoint from being heard because they don't agree with it.''

Factors of Banning Books

Limiting students access to books might solve on family's problems about their child reading a certain book, but it removes the opportunity for another child. Banning books has a ripple effect that impacts the rights of other readers. When individuals restrict their children from reading certain books, they can't enforce those beliefs onto other children and families. Banning books has the potential to create gaps in knowledge for young learners. Whether it's a classic novel or a new book that has been banned, banning books limits access and has the potential to leave students behind some of their classmates.

What Future Teachers Think

Not only does book banning have an impact on students, but it also has an impact on teachers. While veteran teachers, have been dealing with censorship in schools for a while, this is something new to student teachers. A Sophomore elementary education major at Maryville University shares their opinion on the matter. This student stated they would like to remain anonymous ''As a future educator, it is important that we include our students' lived experiences and cultures as part of the instruction. This means that educators should be able to embrace their students' identities that are associated with their race, gender, language, etc. Banning children from being able to see different cultures, same-sex couples, and languages in books, closes their world off. It makes them only view the world one way.''

Ways To Stop Books From Being Censored

One of the best ways to stop books from being censored in schools is to stay informed. Follow organizations such as the American Library Association and We Need Diverse Books to stay up to date on everything that is happening with banned books in schools. Speak out against book banning. Attend school board, library, PTA, or public hearings were banned and challenged books are being discussed and be prepared to speak out.

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The Negative Effects Of Book Banning In The Classroom

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
With an attempt to keep the innocence of children, book banning presents many negative effects for teachers, students, and classrooms. Book banning has a long history throughout the world. Books are continuously challenged and banned at local schools and libraries.

# data[].attributes.body
https://www.maryvillepawprint.com/the-negative-effects-of-book-banning-in-the-classroom/#:~:text=Banning%20books%20has%20a%20ripple,in%20knowledge%20for%20young%20learners.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
With an attempt to keep the innocence of children, book banning presents many negative effects for teachers, students, and classrooms. Book banning has a long history throughout the world. Books are continuously challenged and banned at local schools and libraries. When a book gets challenged or banned, someone else is trying to decide what is best for everyone based on his or her own beliefs and feelings. If they succeed, people can no longer access those books. When this happens, these individuals don't consider the negative effects it can have on students and teachers. For students, banning books means narrowing their world view. For teachers, it means an ever-changing curriculum and fear of personal choice. Book banning is one of the most common ways to censor education.

How Book Banning Impacts Students

Those who are affected the most by book banning are the students in the classroom. When books are banned or challenged, the footing of the curriculum becomes unstable. By opening children up to places, people, and different cultures, books help children develop empathy for others. By nature, children are very self-focused. It is hard for them to imagine different experiences and lives outside of their own. Books that show representation of different people and situations that are different from there's can teach them empathy. Books can also provide representation to children who come from marginalized communities. When you take these books away from students, it gives them a narrow way of looking at the world. Students will not be able to understand different cultures, worldviews, religions, etc., if individuals keep banning books that have these elements.

Banning books can stunt children's curiosity about the world and other people. College student Kerinna Kanters expresses why she thinks book banning has a negative effect on students. ''Removing books has a negative impact because it is censorship. When you censor certain ideas and beliefs, you create a more xenophobic and ignorant society. This is teaching students that it is okay to stop an idea or viewpoint from being heard because they don't agree with it.''

Factors of Banning Books

Limiting students access to books might solve on family's problems about their child reading a certain book, but it removes the opportunity for another child. Banning books has a ripple effect that impacts the rights of other readers. When individuals restrict their children from reading certain books, they can't enforce those beliefs onto other children and families. Banning books has the potential to create gaps in knowledge for young learners. Whether it's a classic novel or a new book that has been banned, banning books limits access and has the potential to leave students behind some of their classmates.

What Future Teachers Think

Not only does book banning have an impact on students, but it also has an impact on teachers. While veteran teachers, have been dealing with censorship in schools for a while, this is something new to student teachers. A Sophomore elementary education major at Maryville University shares their opinion on the matter. This student stated they would like to remain anonymous ''As a future educator, it is important that we include our students' lived experiences and cultures as part of the instruction. This means that educators should be able to embrace their students' identities that are associated with their race, gender, language, etc. Banning children from being able to see different cultures, same-sex couples, and languages in books, closes their world off. It makes them only view the world one way.''

Ways To Stop Books From Being Censored

One of the best ways to stop books from being censored in schools is to stay informed. Follow organizations such as the American Library Association and We Need Diverse Books to stay up to date on everything that is happening with banned books in schools. Speak out against book banning. Attend school board, library, PTA, or public hearings were banned and challenged books are being discussed and be prepared to speak out.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Negative Effects Of Book Banning In The Classroom

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With an attempt to keep the innocence of children, book banning presents many negative effects for teachers, students, and classrooms. Book banning has a long history throughout the world. Books are continuously challenged and banned at local schools and libraries.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Attempts to Ban Books Are Accelerating and Becoming More Divisive

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To mark Banned Books Week, the American Library Association released a report on the rise in censorship efforts: In 2022, there have been attempts to restrict access to 1,651 titles.

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https://pen.org/report/banned-usa-growing-movement-to-censor-books-in-schools/

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The Most Frequently Banned Authors

The most banned authors include winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature, the National Book Award for Young People's Literature, the Booker Prize, the Newbery Award, the Caldecott Medal, the Eisner Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the NAACP Image Award, the GLAAD Award for Media Representation, the Stonewall Award, and more.

Hopkins, Ellen - 14 titles - 43 bans - 20 districts

Kobabe, Maia - 1 title - 41 bans - 41 districts

Morrison, Toni - 3 titles - 34 bans - 25 districts

Johnson, George M. - 2 titles - 30 bans - 29 districts

Myracle, Lauren - 11 titles - 30 bans - 16 districts

Pérez, Ashley Hope - 1 title - 23 bans - 23 districts

Thomas, Angie - 2 titles - 19 bans - 17 districts

Silvera, Adam - 9 titles - 18 bans - 13 districts

Reynolds, Jason - 6 titles - 18 bans - 11 districts

Maas, Sarah J. - 8 titles - 18 bans - 10 districts

Levithan, David - 15 titles - 17 bans - 18 districts

Alexie, Sherman - 2 titles - 17 bans - 17 districts

Evison, Jonathan - 1 title - 17 bans - 17 districts

Andrews, Jesse - 2 titles - 17 bans - 16 districts

Faruqi, Saadia - 17 titles - 17 bans - 2 districts

Jules, Jacqueline - 17 titles - 17 bans - 2 districts

Do, Anh - 17 titles - 17 bans - 1 district

Green, John - 3 titles - 16 bans - 15 districts

Atwood, Margaret - 3 titles - 15 bans - 11 districts

Hutchinson, Shaun David - 6 titles - 15 bans - 7 districts

Albertalli, Becky - 7 titles - 14 bans - 11 districts

Miedoso, Andrés - 14 titles - 14 bans - 1 district

Gino, Alex - 2 titles - 13 bans - 11 districts

Woodson, Jacqueline - 11 titles - 13 bans - 6 districts

Asher, Jay - 1 title - 12 bans - 12 districts

Hosseini, Khaled - 1 title - 12 bans - 12 districts

Dawson, Juno - 2 titles - 12 bans - 11 districts

Tamaki, Mariko - 2 titles - 12 bans - 11 districts

Picoult, Jodi - 3 titles - 12 bans - 10 districts

Glines, Abbi - 9 titles - 12 bans - 5 districts

Peters, Julie Anne - 8 titles - 12 bans - 4 districts

Cast, Kristen - 12 titles - 12 bans - 1 district

Cast, P. C. - 12 titles - 12 bans - 1 district

Kuklin, Susan - 1 title - 11 bans - 11 districts

Telgemeier, Raina - 1 title - 11 bans - 11 districts

Jennings, Jazz - 2 titles - 11 bans - 10 districts

Stone, Nic - 3 titles - 11 bans - 10 districts

Lockhart, E. - 3 titles - 11 bans - 8 districts

Brown, Monica - 10 titles - 11 bans - 2 districts

Kendi, Ibram X. - 7 titles - 10 bans - 12 districts

Anderson, Laurie Halse - 3 titles - 10 bans - 10 districts

Curato, Mike - 1 title - 10 bans - 10 districts

Rosen, L. C. - 1 title - 10 bans - 10 districts

Clare, Cassandra - 5 titles - 10 bans - 8 districts

Arnold, Elana K. - 7 titles - 10 bans - 5 districts

Konigsberg, Bill - 5 titles - 10 bans - 5 districts

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Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Ban Books - PEN America

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PEN America's report on school book bans offers the most comprehensive look at banned books in the 2021-22 school year, with counting more than 2,500 bans.

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https://connectusfund.org/16-major-pros-and-cons-of-banning-books-in-schools

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16 Major Pros and Cons of Banning Books in Schools

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Banning books is one of the most common forms of censorship that exists in the world today. Banned Books Week began in 1982 to highlight the issues that surround this issue. Since the start of

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https://www.edweek.org/teaching-learning/as-book-bans-escalate-heres-what-you-need-to-know/2022/09#:~:text=2022%20book%20bans%20are%20set,reached%20an%20all%2Dtime%20high.

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As Book Bans Escalate, Here’s What You Need to Know

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Catch up on numbers and findings from new reports on the growing push to ban books in schools and libraries.

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https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/whos-behind-the-push-to-ban-books-in-schools-180980818/#:~:text=But%20now%2C%20four%20decades%20later,which%20covered%201%2C648%20unique%20books.

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It's Banned Books Week, an annual campaign that began in 1982 to celebrate the First Amendment and encourage the protection of controversial materials. But now, four decades later, book bans are on the rise, according to a new report from the free speech nonprofit PEN America.

Between July 2021 and June 2022, the report-Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Censor Books in Schools-found 2,532 instances of individual bans, which covered 1,648 unique books. PEN America tracks the bans in a public spreadsheet, which indicates that the most-banned book is Maia Kobabe's Gender Queer: A Memoir.

The bans took place in 138 school districts across 32 states; in total, those school districts enroll nearly 4 million students. (These numbers only account for the bans that PEN America was able to track, and the organization says that more likely exist.) The report found that 96 percent of the bans did not follow the best practice guidelines for book challenges outlined by the American Library Association (ALA) and the National Coalition Against Censorship.

About 41 percent of the banned titles explicitly address LGBTQ themes, making these the biggest target of the bans. Books involving sexual content-such as stories about teen pregnancy, sexual assault and abortion-account for 22 percent of the titles. About 21 percent directly address race and racism, while 40 percent feature major characters of color.

The team behind Banned in the USA wanted to determine where book bans originated. They found that in many instances, the bans were the calculated result of work by advocacy groups.

"[T]he large majority of book bans underway today are not spontaneous, organic expressions of citizen concern," the report states. "Rather, they reflect the work of a growing number of advocacy organizations that have made demanding censorship of certain books and ideas in schools part of their mission."

PEN America identified 50 groups, some with hundreds of regional chapters, pushing for book bans across the country. The majority of those groups-73 percent-have formed since 2021.

"These groups probably do not necessarily represent a range of beliefs from our democracy," PEN America's Jonathan Friedman, one of the report's authors, tells Education Week's Eesha Pendharkar. "So they're having an outsized impact in a lot of places on what it is that everybody gets to read."

Such groups have played a hand in many of the book bans that took place over the last school year; 20 percent of bans can be directly linked to their work, while they appear to have influenced an additional 30 percent.

"This is a concerted, organized, well-resourced push at censorship," Suzanne Nossel, the chief executive of PEN America, tells the New York Times' Elizabeth A. Harris. "[The effort] is ideologically motivated and politically expedient, and it needs to be understood as such in order to be confronted and addressed properly."

Last week, the ALA released its own report, which examines book bans since the beginning of 2022, and found a similar increase in bans.

"I've never seen anything like this," Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom, tells Hillel Italie of the Associated Press (AP). "It's both the number of challenges and the kinds of challenges. It used to be a parent had learned about a given book and had an issue with it. Now we see campaigns where organizations are compiling lists of books, without necessarily reading or even looking at them."

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Over 1,600 Books Were Banned During the Past School Year

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It's Banned Books Week, an annual campaign that began in 1982 to celebrate the First Amendment and encourage the protection of controversial materials. But now, four decades later, book bans are on the rise, according to a new report from the free speech nonprofit PEN America.

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This article talks about the different variables involved with censorship in education. They also talk about keeping children pure, however, this is the only setting where they can learn things about real life. Schools should be able to teach children open real world problems.

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Censorship In Schools And The Effects On Our Children

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Censorship in schools may be limiting your child. Learn how book censorship in schools is adding to the growing problem of censorship in America. The latest advice for parents from LifeScript.com.

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https://www.procon.org/headlines/banned-books-top-3-pros-and-cons/

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The American Library Association (ALA) has tracked book challenges, which are attempts to remove or restrict materials, since 1990. In 2020, the ALA recorded 156 reported book challenges in the United States, a significant decrease from the 377 reported challenges in 2019 perhaps due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, in 2022 challenges jumped to an all-time high with in 2021 with 729 challenges, containing a total of 1,597 books.

In 2022, attempts to ban books doubled from 2021 with 1,269 attempts to ban 2,571 unique titles, according to the ALA. The numbers also reflect a trend in which one complaint includes challenges for multiple books, whereas in the past most complaints only included one book. As of Aug. 31, 2023, there were 695 book challenges 1,915 unique titles; the ALA notes this is a 20% increase from 2022.

In most years, about 10% of the reported challenges result in removal or ban from the school or library. However, in 2016, five of the top ten most challenged books were removed. The ALA estimates that only about 3% to 18% of challenges are reported to its Office for Intellectual Freedom, meaning that the actual number of attempts to ban books is likely much higher.

In 2021, challenges were most frequently brought by parents (39%), followed by patrons (24%), a board or administration (18%), librarians or teachers (6%), elected officials (2%), and students (1%). Books were most often challenged at school libraries (44%), public libraries (37%), schools (18%), and academic libraries (1%).

Sexually explicit content, offensive language, and "unsuited to any age group" are the top three reasons cited for requesting a book be removed. The percentage of Americans who thought any books should be banned increased from 18% in 2011 to 28% in 2015, and 60% of people surveyed believed that children should not have access to books containing explicit language in school libraries, according to The Harris Poll. A 2022 poll found 71% disagreed with efforts to have books removed, including 75% of Democrats, 58% of independents, and 70% of Republicans.

Should Parents or Other Adults Be Able to Ban Books from Schools and Libraries?

Pro 1

Parents have the right to decide what material their children are exposed to and when.

Having books with adult topics available in libraries limits parents' ability to choose when their children are mature enough to read specific material. "Literary works containing explicit [scenes, as well as] vulgar and obscene language" were on the approved reading list for grades 7-12, according to Speak up for Standards, a group seeking age-appropriate reading materials for students in Dallas, Texas.

If books with inappropriate material are available in libraries, children or teens can be exposed to books their parents wouldn't approve of before the parents even find out what their children are reading.

Bans are necessary because "opting your child out of reading [a certain] book doesn't protect him or her. They are still surrounded by the other students who are going to be saturated with this book," said writer Macey France.
Read More

Pro 2

Children should not be exposed to sex, violence, drug use, or other inappropriate topics in school or public libraries.

Books in the young adult genre often contain adult themes that young people aren't ready to experience. Of the top ten most challenged books in 2020, one had LGBTQ+ content, two were sexually explicit, five dealt with racism and anti-police opinions, and others had profanity and drug use.

According to Jenni White, a former public school science teacher, "Numerous studies on the use of graphic material by students indicate negative psychological effects," including having "more casual sex partners and [beginning] having sex at younger ages."

The American Academy of Pediatrics has found that exposure to violence in media, including in books, can impact kids by making them act aggressively and desensitizing them to violence.

Kim Heinecke, a mother of four, wrote to her local Superintendent of Public Schools that "It is not a matter of 'sheltering' kids. It is a matter of guiding them toward what is best. We are the adults. It is our job to protect them - no matter how unpopular that may seem."
Read More

Pro 3

Keeping books with inappropriate content out of libraries protects kids, but doesn't stop people from reading those books or prevent authors from writing them.

Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council noted that removing certain books from libraries is about showing discretion and respecting a community's values, and doesn't prevent people from getting those books elsewhere: "It's an exaggeration to refer to this as book banning. There is nothing preventing books from being written or sold, nothing to prevent parents from buying it or children from reading it."

What some call "book banning," many see as making responsible choices about what books are available in public and school libraries. "Is it censorship that you're unable to go to your local taxpayer-funded branch and check out a copy of the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion'? For better or for worse, these books are still widely available. Your local community has simply decided that finite public resources are not going to be spent disseminating them," Weekly Standard writer and school board member Mark Hemingway stated.
Read More

Con 1

Parents may control what their own children read, but don't have a right to restrict what books are available to other people.

Parents who don't like specific books can have their kids opt out of an assignment without infringing on the rights of others.

The National Coalition against Censorship explained that "Even books or materials that many find 'objectionable' may have educational value, and the decision about what to use in the classroom should be based on professional judgments and standards, not individual preferences."

In the 1982 Supreme Court ruling on Board of Education v. Pico, Justice William Brennan wrote that taking books off of library shelves could violate students' First Amendment rights, adding that "Local school boards may not remove books from school libraries simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books."
Read More

Con 2

Many frequently challenged books help people get a better idea of the world and their place in it.

Robie H. Harris, author of frequently challenged children's books including It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing up, Sex, and Sexual Health, stated, "I think these books look at the topics, the concerns, the worry, the fascination that kids have today... It's the world in which they're living."

Many books that have long been considered to be required reading to become educated about literature and American history are frequently challenged, such as: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, The Color Purple by Alice Walker, Beloved by Toni Morrison, and Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston.

46 of the Radcliffe Publishing Group's "Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century" are frequently challenged. Banning these books would deprive students of essential cultural and historical knowledge, as well as differing points of view.
Read More

Con 3

Books are a portal to different life experiences and reading encourages empathy and social-emotional development.

One study found that reading J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, which is frequently challenged for religious concerns about witchcraft, "improved attitudes" about immigrants, homosexuals, and refugees.

Another study found that reading narrative fiction helped readers understand their peers and raised social abilities.

A study published in Basic and Applied Social Psychology found that people who read a story about a Muslim woman were less likely to make broad judgments based on race.

Neil Gaiman, author of the frequently challenged novel Neverwhere, among other books, stated that fiction "build[s] empathy... You get to feel things, visit places and worlds you would never otherwise know. You learn that everyone else out there is a me, as well. You're being someone else, and when you return to your own world, you're going to be slightly changed. Empathy is a tool for building people into groups, for allowing us to function as more than self-obsessed individuals."
Read More

Discussion Questions

1. Should parents or other adults be able to ban books from schools or libraries? Why or why not?

2. Have you read any of the Top 10 Challenged Books of 2021 (see the graphic below)? Should those books be banned or restricted? Explain your answers.

3. Is book banning censorship? Why or why not?

Take Action
1. Evaluate the perspective of parents who would like to remove a book from a school library.

2. Consider " 11 Banned Books through Time " at Encyclopaedia Britannica.

3. Explore the American Library Association's resources and efforts against banning books, including the 13 most challenged books of 2022.

4. Consider how you felt about the issue before reading this article. After reading the pros and cons on this topic, has your thinking changed? If so, how? List two to three ways. If your thoughts have not changed, list two to three ways your better understanding of the "other side of the issue" now helps you better argue your position.

5. Push for the position and policies you support by writing US national senators and representatives.
Sources

28.

Miranda Mazariegos and Meghan Collins Sullivan, "Efforts to Ban Books Jumped an 'Unprecedented' Four-Fold in 2021, Ala Report Says," npr.org Apr. 4, 2022

29.

American Library Association, "Voters Oppose Book Bans in Libraries," ala.org (accessed Apr. 4, 2022)

30.

American Library Association, "Banned Books: Free Downloads," ala.org (accessed Aug. 2, 2022)

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Banned Books Pros and Cons - Top 3 Arguments For and Against

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Proponents say parents have the right to choose what kids read. Opponents say that right doesn't extend to everyone's children.

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Conduct research on book bans or censorship in educational settings. Read your higher-level questions from last week to get you started on searching. Upload a link to a reputable article that you find interesting which you can reference in your Socratic Seminar. In your post, write brief 3-5 sentence summary of the main points in the article. No repeats amongst the posts. Then, upvote and write comments on at least three of your peers' articles/posts.