Moms Against Liberty

 In the late 90s, parents in Clarence demanded that Harry Potter books be banned because they "promoted witchcraft." 

Just a few years later, a group began agitating for the banning of a wide variety of books for various reasons. It became a topic of discussion at a school board meeting in 2014. A lot of people turned out in order to combat any notion of banning books. Indeed, nothing was banned and the whole effort fizzled.

It fizzled in large part because kids showed up to defend their constitutional rights. They showed up to defend their intellect and their maturity. They argued for the idea that they are capable of critical thinking and to put material that some might find objectionable within their proper contexts. 

There is, therefore, something downright Orwellian about "Moms for Liberty." You cannot simultaneously be for "liberty" and also for banning books and censorship; these are irreconcilable concepts. 

"Moms for Liberty" is part of a nationwide (read: astroturf) influence group that had its genesis in battles over Covid restrictions, masking, vaccinations, and distancing/closures. Now that Covid restrictions are a thing of the past (despite the fact that Covid itself remains very firmly a part of our present), a new raison d'être is to demand the removal and banning of allegedly "obscene" and "pornographic" books.

What is reproduced above purports to be a press release that the local branch of "Moms for Liberty", which is very active in Hamburg, issued a few days ago. Much like the lists brought forth in 2014, it singles out specific literary works and reduces them to a sentence or two about something they contain to which these "Moms" object.

Gender Queer: "It is available" at two high school libraries. It is an autobiographical graphic novel that discusses the author's own experiences about sexuality in high school. In fact, the description explains that the author discovers that they are asexual. 

Started as a way to explain to eir family what it means to be nonbinary and asexual, Gender Queer is more than a personal story: it is a useful and touching guide on gender identity—what it means and how to think about it—for advocates, friends, and humans everywhere.

The first thing a parent who objects to this can do is to instruct their child to not read or take out this book. Problem solved! Nowhere is it indicated that this is required reading for anyone, but any notion that a coming-of-age book be out-of-reach for kids who are coming of age is absurd on its face. When "Moms for Liberty" crow that it is the number one most "challenged" book, they are really saying that they not only don't want their kids to lay eyes on it - they demand the right to dictate to you what your own kids do or don't see. 

I can guarantee your Snapchat-addicted teenagers have seen a lot worse, and that their minds are far more open to this than yours. No one is forcing your kid to read it.

Lawn Boy: Also a big target for book banners, "Moms for Liberty" objects because it contains text concerning the sexual abuse of an adolescent boy. Indeed, the right-wing agitation against this book has led - directly and intentionally - to death threats against its author. I suspect that the real objection isn't over a few sexual passages, but the fact that it explores the coming of age of a gay, immigrant adolescent and themes not only involving sexuality but racism and bigotry. Again, there is no accusation that it is on any mandatory reading list and surely parental rights extend to the right of a parent to instruct their child not to look at this book. This is not, however, a license to withdraw the book from all. 

The Bluest Eye: "Moms for Liberty" complain that it contains sexually explicit language including descriptions of rape. It does, but it's not the whole book and it doesn't serve to encourage such behavior., This 1970 Toni Morrison novel also happens to explore issues surrounding racism, bigotry, and in this case sexual abuse. One might argue that having high school students read about things like sexual abuse helps them to develop empathy and to regard sexual abuse with appropriate abhorrence. Query what goal is aided by shielding teenagers from literary works that depict man's inhumanity against man. 

But Morrison's novel is not part of any curriculum, according to the complaint, nor is it on a mandatory or recommended reading list. The objection here is to its very presence and existence on the library shelves. Setting aside, again, a parent's right and ability to instruct their own children to avoid the book, and the fundamental constitutional unfairness of attempts to ban it for all, this is not some prurient pornography but passages that advance the story and help the reader to understand the brutal, criminal treatment of the book's youthful protagonist. 

Looking for Alaska: The objection here is that the book contains passages having to do with oral sex. One scene of sexuality does not a 300-page book make. Again, it deals with the pain and anguish of coming-of-age to adulthood - something every high school kid wrestles with. It also touches on death, drunk driving, and peer pressure - all topics that kids need to hear about. 

The "Moms for Liberty" spokesperson portrays herself and her group as victims of mean parents who are perfectly okay with their kids reading "pornography" in school. I don't see any pornography here. All of this is a lot closer to Judy Blume than Penthouse Forum. It promotes an ideology that equates "liberty" and individual rights with a concomitant right to restrict the rights of others. There is no fundamental accusation that any of these books were required reading for anyone. Even the Mom for Liberty who complained that she found one of these books on a summer reading list surely knows that these lists typically contain a long list of proposed titles, from which the student is entitled to select a few. Surely if a parent is worried about their child seeing something objectionable, they are free to select a more appropriate book, but one's personal objection or opinion about what constitutes "pornography" does not come with a right to demand removal of the title altogether. 

But perhaps the funniest/saddest thing about this whole thing is that "Moms for Liberty" seems unironically to be using this list as its source. The irony is just so palpable and so widespread! "Liberty" through bans! Selecting books to ban by using the *checks notes* lists of most-challenged books put out by the Office for Intellectual Freedom of the American Library Association.

But please make no mistake about it: these objections to sexual content are a masquerade and a pretext. The real objection has to do with LGBT rights, race, discrimination, and whatever they can label as "woke" or "CRT." It is a distinctly right-wing partisan organization with particular right-wing partisan points of view.

Being angry about masking is so last week. The new outrage is so manufactured as to be almost artificial. When these people start to demand that the Clarence School Board restrict what books your kid is allowed to read, understand that this is un-American censorship and that your liberty and your kids' liberty are under threat.