A recent news article in the Topeka Capital-Journal about the GOP in Shawnee County Kansas targeting the library caught my eye the other day:
Shawnee County GOP targets books in public library children’s section
Much like many library folk I keep an eye out for news on attempted and actual book bans & attacks on libraries that take place in the US and abroad. This particular attack is a bit closer to home than most as it targets Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library, the largest library system to the west of me in Kansas where I currently reside.
On the surface the article reads as if parents and politicians are in uproar about unsuitable books on the shelves of the children’s library.
But, if you take a ever so slightly deeper look at the books mentioned in the article and shown in the related photograph, namely :
It’s totally Normal by Monica and Asha Mehta
Beyond Bananas and Condoms by Dee Whitnell
You, Me and Infinity by Deb Caletti
Here’s to Us by Becky Albertalli & Adam Silvera
and spend a few minutes on the TSCPL catalog, you will find that all the abovementioned books are shelved in the Young Adult collection in the library.
There is also an edited phone video that was released in the online TCJ on the same day:
Shawnee County residents have concerns with books at local library
The video features attorney Kathy Brown (allegedly the Kansas chapter leader of MassResistance a ‘pro family’ anti-LGBTQ+ group) reading quotes from Gender Queer a graphic memoir by Maia Kobabe. Brown claims “That is a quotation taken from a book in the juvenile library, recommended for children as young as 10”
Except that it is not a children’s book, Gender Queer is an adult non-fiction graphic memoir; physical copies appear to be no longer available in the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library, but when they were, they were shelved in the Graphic Novel section, not in the Children’s or YA sections of the library. Gender Queer is rated as mature and according to Common Sense Media, the recommended reading age is 16+ Indeed Maia Kobabe is on record as saying I don’t recommend this book for kids!
You can view photographs from the meeting on the USA Today Network Reuters Connect website:
The video also artfully pans across a shelf in the YA section featuring non-fiction books by and about transgender people and their experiences, before cutting to two concerned residents, Republican State Representative Candidate Lanell Griffith “We got to protect the kids. You know the GOP is all about protecting children in every way possible” and Toni Stewart, Kansas State Director of the Concerned Women for America “We want to protect children in every way possible…put the books in the adult section where maybe they are more governed by ages instead of just kids wandering in and pulling a book off the shelf and going, ‘What’s this Mom?’”
The video then cuts back to the bookshelf and a patron pulls a book from the shelf, the book is Naked: Not your Average Sex Encyclopedia by Myriam Daguzan Bernier – another book available in the young Adult collection.
The video is slickly cut together, it shows a selection of books, that, if actually shelved in the Children’s Library rather than the Young Adult collection may cause consternation. The talking heads, all speak about ‘protecting the children’, although protecting them from what is never made clear; accurate sex education perhaps, but that is protecting their parents from questions that may make them feel uncomfortable.
I feel the need to stress again, that all the books mentioned are Young Adult and not Children’s books as the original article and concerned residents claimed. Except for Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe which is an adult Graphic Memoir.
Public Libraries in the US do not act in loco parentis, indeed in all the libraries I have visited, worked in or read about in the US the view that the only people that can determine the appropriateness of what children read is their parents (or other legal guardians).
In closing if you are an adult concerned about parental rights when it comes to children selecting books from the library, you have the right to browse the library shelves with your child and discuss their potential choices in the moment and not blaming library workers if you trust your child to go to the library unchaperoned and they come home with something that upsets you.
Edited to add: the response by TSCPL CEO Marie Pyko in defense of the library’s first amendment rights to provide a diverse collection is worth reading in its entirety:
