Books including "Gender Queer" being pulled from schools, sparking controversy
ABC News
Books including "Gender Queer" being pulled from schools, sparking controversy.
In pockets of the country, state education officials and local school boards are responding to complaints from some parents by removing books from schools and conducting widespread audits of school libraries, to weed out texts deemed inappropriate for students.
But these efforts have sparked blowback from authors and advocacy groups, who say the removals -- which tend to target texts on culturally sensitive topics -- risk depriving certain students from reading books that reflect their own lives and enhance their cultural literacy.
In northern Virginia, a state whose candidates for governor sparred this fall over critical race theory, a county school board member drew attention this week for suggesting that a book centered on a 10-year-old boy who is sexually abused by an older man, should be burned.
Rabih Abuismail, a 24-year-old member of the Spotsylvania County school board, argued in a board meeting Monday night that the inclusion of gay sex in the book, "33 Snowfish," by Adam Rapp, which had brought a complaint from one parent that night, disqualified it from being in school libraries.