Most Challenged Books of 2019
The American Library Association’s (ALA) Office of Intellectual Freedom (OIF) has released the 2019 most challenged book list. OIF complies reports of challenges and other activity from libraries and schools. The list is used to structure Banned Book Week at the end of September. The list is largely as expected with queer-inclusive stories now taking up eight slots, the most I can recall. The assault on representations of queer identity has been the story of recent censorship activity.
To begin with the two exceptions to the queer-inclusive dominance of this list, I’ve been expecting The Handmaid’s Tale to pop up since the Hulu series started. The book is used often in AP English courses and faces challenges because of the language and sexual violence. I wrote about an earlier challenge that is illustrative of the complaints. At the turn of the millennium Harry Potter was the most challenged set of books by far. It was accused of encouraging witchcraft and teaching children to disobey the rules. When an Arkansas school board censored the books, one board member testified that it could lead to school shootings because it taught disrespect for authority. You can read about this in the lawyer’s story of the fight against the restrictions. Most of the hostility faded by around 2007 as the last book was published. Most people treat it as a quaint artifact but then a Catholic school banned them last year for containing real spells and risking possession.
The big news in this list is that it is now dominated by representations of the LGBTQ spectrum. Three of them tell stories of trans kids. George may as well have a permanent place on the list. Along with I am Jazz, it has the temerity to depict trans kids existing and thus gets attacked for being inappropriate, often described as sexual in nature, and indoctrination. As I’ve written before, many challengers invoke the idea that reading such stories will turn their kids trans. A nonfiction book reporting the stories of trans teens, Beyond Magenta had faded into the background a bit but reemerged last year when transphobes started posting a few pages from one story claiming that the book was celebrating pedophilia. (I tracked this back to an Australian group but prefer not to link to hate groups directly whenever possible). That then began to circulate in other groups and likely triggered challenges. Drama hit the list again because it dares to have a chaste kiss between two boys, which I’ve seen people describe as akin to pornography. One such challenge occurred in Cheyenne, Wyoming, where the school retained the book. Sex education books are never popular with a certain group of people, those who believe ignorance will keep their children morally pure, and popularity drops when the books include material about sexual orientation and gender identity as Sex is a Funny Word does. While I’m not surprised to see Marlon Bundo on the list as it lampoons the homophobe that currently occupies the vice presidency, And Tango Makes Three was a surprise. Tango was probably the most controversial children’s book of the late 2000s because it depicted two male penguins raising a chick just as the marriage equality debate was cresting. I hadn’t seen a challenge to it in years, however, and so it popping back onto the list is a bit of a surprise. What wasn’t a surprise was the inclusion of Prince & Knight, in fact a few weeks ago I was asked to predict what might be added to this list and this was my pick. It was a safe pick as the book was at the center of two major public censorship battles in West Virginia and Virginia.
What this list can’t show is the radiating effects of challenges. Having examined the documentation to around 250 challenges at this point, I can say that overwhelmingly they fail. My data suggests about 10-15% or so result in a book being restricted or removed and almost always this is in a school environment. One takeaway could be that challenges are unimportant because they are infrequent and fail. But this ignores the evidence that controversy scares away others, causing them to self-censor their collections. It is difficult to say how often this occurs because people rarely declare why they don’t buy a book. Evidence can be inferred, however. I’ve written about the controversy in Loudon County, Virginia, and released the list of books challenged. The school district engaged in a laudable diversity initiative that triggered backlash overwhelmingly against the queer-inclusive titles. What is missing, however, is George. As the book is perfect for 4-6 graders in particular and fits the goal of the initiative the failure to include the book in the classroom libraries is telling. (I infer the failure to include George from the lack of challenges because there is simply no way it would have passed without multiple challenges if it was included.) There is no pedagogical reason for failing to purchase George and in fact it would appear on any list of books compiled for such a project. I can’t say for certain but my guess is that it was not purchased because a quick google search reveals the widespread attacks on the book and the school probably hoped to limit controversy.
Obviously I have nothing but disdain for the arguments challengers make against all of these books. Overwhelmingly they are just cover for the real argument for hiding queer stories from public view because queer people are “inappropriate” for polite society. That said, this list makes me happy because it demonstrates that inclusion of queer-inclusive stories is gradually winning out. As I tell my students, backlash is only possible where you win something. A decade ago, Loudon County would not have been the center of the controversy it has seen because it never would have included the queer stories in the first place. In part because the books simply didn’t exist. Today publishers are putting out an increasing number of high quality queer-inclusive stories because the demand is there. Challengers are lashing out against this because they are losing the battle for inclusion, even if gradually. So I smile at this list and know that it represents an entire generation of readers who will go to the library and find books that reflect their lives in a way that I didn’t have.
