What Kansans can learn from challenged books in their local libraries

2:28AM Dec 12, 2022

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As residents across Kansas and the United States debate the role of race and sexual orientation and public policy, similar debates have been playing out on a smaller scale at community and school libraries. The question what kinds of books should children and teenagers be able to read? My name is Clay wire stone and I'm the Kansas reflectors opinion editor. In this week's podcast, we talk with three colonists who have read some of these challenged books and hear what lessons they've learned. We start this series of conversations with the person who sent in the first review. Laurie Brock is an author who has worked in programs and publications for the Salina Arts Center, as a college and community writing instructor and as director of a foundation funded artists development project in Salina. Fittingly, her interest was piqued when a book was challenged in the town.

Laurie, thanks for joining me. Tell Tell me a little bit about the book that you read and wrote about.

Thanks, Clay for asking me I'm really happy to talk about all boys aren't blue, which has the subtitle a memoir manifesto, which I find really interesting, that doubling of the idea of memoir, The Story of someone's life, being also a manifesto, or a statement of beliefs or, you know, a flag in the ground, and George M. Johnson wrote it in well, I think he wrote it before 2020. But that was the year that it was published. And he was a young, he is a young black queer writer, who was inspired by his own life by popular culture, by his reading, to write the book that he didn't have when he was growing up. And what stays with me after having read it last spring, is the story of his family, actually, his incredible bond with a family that didn't understand him, yet supported him and raised him in ways that facilitated his writing voice. So it's a story of coming of age, and it's aimed at 14 to 18 year olds.

And, and the the piece that you you wrote about, this book also includes some mentions of The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin. Just tell me a little bit about how, how you reacted to the book, what did you how did you feel as as you were reading it,

I felt, I felt that the book wasn't for me, I felt that the book was absolutely aimed at its 14 to 18 year old readers, that it was a book that was documentary, and personal, rather than artistic. And so that's why I brought in James Baldwin, who is always artistic, and that's my own personal need as a reader is for gorgeous sentences. And I don't just mean that in terms of surface beauty. I mean, that in terms of meaning, and in terms of resonance, so that was important for me to, to think about Baldwin's own black queerness writing in 1963 in The Fire Next Time, about about America, and he continues to be such an important prophet in my reading eyeballs.

Well, I mean, just within the last week or so, I, I found some writing by James Baldwin on I mean, it's it's very, it's the I mean, he's a remarkable writer, just in the sense that I think the, the way he writes about things is I mean, it's incredibly pertinent to his time and to our time. It seems to have lost No, no, no relevance at all.

I know. It's sort of amazing.

So, so talk a little bit, you have real ties in the Salina area. So talk about kind of the history I mean, you know, we're going just a few months back this year now, back to May or so. What made this book controversial in the Salina area, kind of what what happened there.

I can't tell you the whole story, although I have spoken with teachers and I have spoken with the Public Information person at the district, but I I can tell you part of the story, which is that parents are actually I should, I should just call them salida residents because in the case of both parents, both individuals who brought the challenge to the school board, none of them had students in the district one of them was one family was homeschooled the other family took their students out of the public school into into a private school because of masking requirements during COVID. So these were individuals who found sections of the book to be objectionable, specifically sections that describe sexual behavior. And they they challenged the South High School Library where the where the book was, and continues to be on the shelf. And the what happens in Salina is that the building puts a committee together when there's a challenge. And the building committee, which is the principal and the librarian and the teacher, and you know, maybe somebody else said that we have we followed our library selection guidelines. And this book is absolutely appropriate for our readers. And so it was appealed by these individuals, and the district put together a committee that had community members on it and more more people from the district. They made the same findings, it was appealed yet again. And that was appealed to the school board, which is the final recourse for anybody challenging a book. And the school board had such a thoughtful response that I quote in the piece about, about why they chose to keep the book in the library, which is where it where it continues to be in the high school libraries. And I was concerned clay because I have a 30 year relationship with the Salina School District, my son graduated from high school there in 2005. And I started out when he was five and kindergarten as a parent, volunteer in his kindergarten class. And I've been a teaching artist in the slanted district for that long or almost that long, I get to go into classrooms, mostly today, these days, middle school, alternative school and high school classrooms. To work with students on creative writing, we usually focus on poetry, but sometimes we write short fiction too together. And because I know the district in that way over that long term, I just had such I continue to have such respect for the teachers there, whose classrooms that I've been privileged to enter, are so filled with respect for and trust for, for students and children as as individuals. And I was thinking as I was reading, about the challenge, how people challenging books or working for parent control, which I think is the latest sort of move, might spend a year in and out of the classroom, of their own students, classrooms or other classrooms, if they have a way of getting inside them. And really listening and seeing what's going on in classrooms and seeing what's going on in the way that students are treated as as intelligent and thoughtful, and reasonable human beings who can get together in a group and have interesting and significant conversations. And I think that would help people understand how education works these days, and how contemporary students are dealing with these major issues of our time.

Sure. And I mean, I think that kind of goes into my my last question for you, which is, what do you wish that the folks who challenged this book are the folks who were kind of caught up in this, this action? And so I know what do you wish that they could have gotten out of the book if they had read it or if they had experienced it?

My wish always is for both challenges in book bands, for those who are concerned to actually first read the entire book, to not focus on passages, but to read it as a whole for its literary and educational merit. And in this case, I think that the literary and educational merit is filled with the currency of today's Popular culture, which is culture, which has importance, it's filled with education for students who have been sexually abused for student, which is a theme, who are struggling with their sexuality, which all adolescents it's part of the adolescent plan to, to experiment and struggle with sexuality, identity and a lot of other things, morality, beliefs. That's just what we're supposed to be doing then as as developing human beings. I really feel strongly that it's a book for young adults, that adults can broaden their world by reading about people different that from them.

Well, Laurie, thank you so much for for sharing that with us. I really appreciate it.

Sure. Fun to talk. Thank you.

A controversy in St. Mary's inspired me to ask our next columnist to read a challenged book. Erie riffle is a graduate student, studying higher education administration at the University of Kansas, where she serves as both an academic advisor and assistant complex director. Thanks for coming to the podcast.

Yes, thank you for inviting me.

So you read a book called Melissa, it was originally I believe, titled, George, that has caused some controversy up in St. Mary's. So just let's start with what's What's the book about? Tell me a little bit about it?

Okay, so the book, Melissa is about a young trans girl who's coming out in middle school. And so the book really is just that journey of not only accepting oneself, but also figuring out how to tell others in the fear associated with doing so. And just starting that journey, towards making that change, to becoming more authentic self.

Sure. And as as you read this book, and thought about it, you know, what were your reactions.

I really, I really love this book. And I will stay I will say this also in my report that I'm also writing as well on it. I really wish I had this book when I was a kid. Because I had a lot of the feelings that Melissa shares with the reader in the book about not feeling right within one's own body, but also a trepidation and how they can share that with others. What are your classmates gonna think? What are your parents going to think? And so I think it's a, honestly, I think it's a really good tool that not only gives transgender kids representation, but also a feeling of acceptance within themselves, and can also be a guide to helping cisgender students also understand what their transgender friend might be going through. And if they don't have a trans friend, it might help them develop empathy. For for those other students and for their other friends. Now,

what do you think about the book? And I guess I should add here that I had suggested that to you that you might be interested in taking a look at it for this piece? What do you think, led to the controversy in St. Mary's, what do you think parents might have been reacting to up there?

Yeah, so I don't quite know and don't want to assume necessarily all of the identities are beliefs of the parents or religious beliefs. However, St. Mary's is a population that's highly Catholic. And so I feel there's a clash between someone's religious views. And with this book, I think it really just comes down to a willful ignorance or belief in hate through religion, which is what they use to justify this hate. And that's what causes parents to come up and be susceptible to the demonization of not only trans kids, but adults who are supportive of trans kids as well as trans adults themselves.

Yeah, and I mean, I think something that you you mentioned in your column about the book that I found really interesting is so much of the rhetoric around trans kids in schools recently is this idea that somehow something secret and bad is happening that's being hidden from the adults and children's lives. And yet, one of the points of the book, Melissa, is really about communication with adults, and being able to say kind of what the main character is going through in her life to them.

Yeah, and that's one thing I really liked that was highlighted in the book by the author. But also, I think that's something that we need to contextualize that that's not that's not just fiction, either the best way to support trans youth, yes, they do need to feel safe. But they also need to be working with other adults, their parents to help them through that process. And there's no way for them to begin that process. Without that support. I do have the electronic version of the book, the ebook. And one of the I haven't pulled up on page 9293 is a conversation between Melissa and her mom, where she, she says, Mom, I'm a, I'm a girl. And eventually, in the conversation, Melissa asked, Are you upset with me? And her mom says no. But I think you need someone to talk to, I could probably use someone to someone who knows about these things. And so the fact that the author mentioned that of mom also needs support with Melissa is really important. Because this is not a journey that a child can take alone, it shouldn't take along. And so I think that's important to emphasize. Because no one is sneakily trying to get a kid to transition their gender that's not happening. And that's something that is being shared. Purposefully, when it's simply not true.

Well, and I also think, you know, I was having a conversation with someone, you know, with, with another one of our authors about this, and there's just something, there's something about books, right? where books are a kind of a individual medium, right, you're experiencing the book, it's not something that's floating out there in the air. And so even the act of reading a book can sometimes seem like a little bit of a secret to like a parent, who's like, oh, I don't know, what are they reading? What's what's going on there? When even if the book is saying, hey, you need to communicate openly?

Yeah, and I think it's that deep personal connection with a book that I'm an English teacher. So that's why I really enjoy it is that you can get so deeply invested in them. And that's why that representation is so so important. So the book out sorry. Oh, go ahead, please. I was going to say so with the books. I'm wondering if that's a secret, or you're keeping it a secret from your parents. There's a there's a lot of content in books that are aren't banned, that someone could argue for. And I feel that censorship is going down a very dangerous road of we want to censor LGBTQ representation and books. Yet, heterosexual relationships are in the majority of the books that kids already read. So there's this level of high scrutiny that LGBTQ friendly books are put under that isn't happening between heterosexual killings that are common themes for a majority of kids books already?

Sure. And so So finally, what would you say to the folks who challenged this book or who were questioning about it up in St. Mary's? What would you what would you say that you think they could get out of the book?

Yeah, so if you're challenging this book, I really suggest you do a deep dive into read it. Because right now, I feel that a lot of people are jumping the gun, or just jumping into assumptions that are being made by people who already fit your political views or who are going to stir you up. Listen to your trans to the trans community, listen to people who are supportive. Because if you don't give this book the time of day, and you'll you could really be hurting children. And that is what none of us want. And I think that is what's central to this whole debate or this whole conflict right now is there's an assumption that kids are being hurt and that's simply not the case. Yeah, so I would, I would say, do the work, read the book. Think and think think with an open mind, because it's okay to grow as a person and it's okay to realize that Hey, maybe that's what I was thinking back then wasn't in line with what I how I feel now. That's just growing. And that's okay.

Well, Eric, thank you for taking the time to talk to us. I really appreciate it.

Cool. Thank you clay.

Finally, to take the long view, I turned to our columnist Mark McCormack, he's the former executive director of the Kansas African American Museum, and a member of the Kansas African American Affairs Commission. He's also the Deputy Director of Strategic Initiatives at the ACLU of Kansas. Yeah, thanks for having me. I'm so to start from kind of the organizational perspective, I'm sure the the ACLU in Kansas has has looked at that has had concerns about this, what's kind of the landscape as you understand it, with kind of books being challenged in various venues around the state?

There's really interested in question clay, because I have said for years, that if you want to know what's happening in the wider culture, you need to visit a school, or be plugged in to what's happening in school. And so the discussions and the debates that we're having in the culture, about censoring books about what information kids would have access to either in the library or in the classroom, it's being played out now in these book bands. And we get calls fairly frequently, whenever there is a particular book, or a series of books, or an author, who is being threatened with what is essentially being cancelled, because there's content in the book that, you know, a parent somewhere, may not want for their kids, but they're making the decision that no one gets to explore these books, or these ideas. And it is concerning to us at the ACLU of Kansas.

Now, you and I were discussing a little bit, before we started recording this about just the challenge, sometimes when you're a parent, and you're trying to introduce your kids to the kind of the wider world, and, and how that kind of interacts with all of this, I wondered if you could just say a little, you know, talk a little bit about that,

you know, some of the arguments that are being made about, you know, racial content, racial, historical content, good content, I think they come from an honest place, where parents want to make sure that their kids aren't being pushed into discussions, perhaps that they may not be ready, or I'm sympathetic to that idea. I also think that there are people who are weaponizing, this discussion is an attempt to shut down any discussion about these warts that we have, as Americans, it doesn't mean that people don't love America, it just means that maybe they love it enough that they feel like we ought to be discussing these things. As the parent of four black boys, this is a discussion that I've carried around for years, and have wrestled with the idea of what do I share with my kids in order to prepare them for how society is likely to treat them. Because they're African American, versus the idea of, Am I somehow stealing a little bit of their innocence stealing a little bit of their childhood, in the process, and this becomes something that I've been trying to balance over time. And these are discussions that I've had with my kids. Bless you. These are discussions that I've had with my kids, and they aren't easy. So again, while I am sympathetic to the idea that there may be parents who are concerned about what's happening at the library, or what's happening at school. I just never heard of a parent, you know, upset that their kids might be reading too much. And that wrestling with these ideas, helps people mature. And I also think that it makes them more compassionate. And it gives them insight to the kinds of the kinds of things that we're seeing, you know, happening in terms of news and what's happening socially in the country. So I was sharing with you earlier that you know, this was something that I've wrestled with, you know, as a parent.

Well, and I think it's, it's, it's it's also so interesting because As I think part of the concern about books sometimes is that reading a book can be a very personal experience, because it's you and the page, as opposed to something like a computer game or a movie or, or TV where it's just kind of out in the air. And it's kind of, you know, kind of telling you how to feel about it. With with a book, it's a much more kind of intimate thing, and you don't know, what you're getting what a kid might be thinking, or how they might be reacting.

Oh, yeah, I mean, I think that that's one of the joys of reading, where you can completely immerse yourself. And another place or another way of thinking, and again, I think that just makes us better people.

But it also, I think, can make it seem dangerous. You know, if you want to have this idea that I want to know everything that my kid is interacting with our seeing than the idea of the book, The secret book, that's not that it's even secret, I think can be a challenge for some,

you know, it's it's kind of tough, but I feel like I have license to say this, because I am a parent. But our kids are doing things that we don't know about. And if you think as a parent that you have a handle on absolutely everything that the kid is thinking or taking in. You're probably fooling yourself, I think, what's better, and this is the path that I've taken. I'd rather my kids have the tools of discernment. I want them to be people who question everything that is said to them, and even what I say and question everything that they read and become people who can actually think. And that's what I feel like at times is missing from the debate. We're trying to teach people to think we're trying to teach young people to think and to question. Not indoctrinate.

Well on that in that involves reading things that you may disagree with, or perspectives of people who live very different lives than you. And I think that's I mean, just speaking as someone who writes, writes opinion columns, I think people sometimes misunderstand, you know, the the argument, you know, making an argument or being persuasive like that doesn't just involve standing in a corner, it involves understanding of the people that you're arguing against?

Well, quite, I mean, if it was this easy to indoctrinate kids, by forcing them to read or not read something, I think our society would look very different. I do feel like there's a little bit of hysteria here. Some overthink some groupthink. And I don't know, I'm, I'm simply unsympathetic, you know, because I'm sympathetic to any helicopter parent, because you know, I love my kids. And I want what's best for him, I want to protect them. And sometimes the hardest thing to do is to let go a little bit and let them experience themes. So again, I'm sympathetic to that. But, again, I think there are people who have weaponized this conversation, commandeered it. And they want to use it to shut down any discussion about issues that they're concerned about or uncomfortable with. And when they want to pretend that you know certain people and certain events just don't exist or didn't exist. And that's just not the case. And I frankly, don't think you're, you're preparing kids for the world if you're preparing them for a pristine world.

Absolutely. So to kind of wrap up here, we were talking a little bit about some lists of books that have been challenged things that have come up recently, and I was was asking about things that had resonated with with you on that

list. Yeah, one of the books on that list had to do with The Bluest Eye. And there's a there were a series of books that I read, in succession, that that had a huge impact on me. I remember reading the autobiography of Malcolm X, and feeling like a veil had been lifted. I remember reading native sun. I remember reading, if Beale Street could talk. I remember reading Their Eyes Were Watching God. And about that time, I was introduced to The Bluest Eye, and The Bluest Eye is on that list. And it seems to me that that would be a book that every Kansan should read not because it has a particular significance to where we are geographically. But when you think about what people know about the state, a lot of people know about the Brown decision, Brown v Board. And those experiments that Dr. Kenneth Clark did, where he asked black children and he asked white children, Which doll is smart, and Which doll is pretty. And then Which doll looks like you. And we all kind of watched in horror, those of us who've seen this, when Black children's, were asked, you know, which is the stupid doll, and which doll looks like you, they all pointed to the black doll. And so, you know, this, this notion about who was beautiful and who was not and who was smart and who was not. We're still wrestling with these issues today. And that, in the hands of a skilled teacher, we could do a lot to broaden the student's mind, but also, perhaps, rid our society of these kinds of thoughts and ideas. Where I feel like in the last four to six years, we've opened a Pandora's box that we worked really hard to jam some stuff into. And we've opened it up again. And a book like The Bluest Eye is precisely the tool we need to deal with all these issues that have resurfaced in a big way. I don't think they ever really receded. But we're in the middle of a kind of renaissance of racism. And the in that book, among others, that book really gives us the tools to do the kind of analysis that we need.

Well, Mark, thank you so much. I really appreciate you taking the time. Oh,

no problem. Thank you for having me.