Utah Has Banned These 13 Books from All Schools
Utah state law requires school librarians to remove books with sexual content from shelves, even if the overall work has literary value.
The Utah State Board of Education has ordered schools to remove 13 books from classrooms and libraries, including works by award-winning authors Margaret Atwood and Judy Blume, because their content is considered “pornographic” or indecent under a new state law.
The books being banned are:
- A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
- A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas
- A Court of Wings and Ruin by Sarah J. Maas
- A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J. Maas
- A Court of Silver Flames by Sarah J. Maas
- Empire of Storms by Sarah J. Maas
- What Girls Are Made of by Elana K. Arnold
- Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur
- Forever by Judy Blume
- Tilt by Ellen Hopkins
- Fallout by Ellen Hopkins
- Blankets by Craig Thompson
- Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
The list, made public last Friday, was generated to comply with a state law that took effect on July 1.
The law requires local education agencies, including school boards and the governing board of charter schools, to prioritize “protecting children from the harmful effects of illicit pornography over other considerations.” The board said it was committed to enforcing the law.
Traditionally, schools and librarians have looked at the overall content and value of challenged books, rather than cherry-picked selections from such works, when determining whether books should be removed from shelves or banned altogether.
However, the new law refuses to make allowances for works that may contain some adult content but have overriding literary, political, or artistic value. That means any works containing descriptions of sex or masturbation are banned, as are any books with LGBTQ content that opponents may claim is “sexual.”
When a local education body removes a book for violating the law, it must notify the state board of education. When something is removed by three school districts — or two public school districts and five charter schools — the work must be removed from all school library shelves statewide, reports The New York Times.
While only 13 works are currently on the list, that number is expected to grow, perhaps exponentially, as it has become common for conservative activists and parent groups in various states to challenge books they deem inappropriate, and due to the law’s low bar for what constitutes objectionable content.
Critics of book bans frequently argue that parents — and not the government — should determine what is appropriate reading material for their own children but should not be able to dictate what other children read.
PEN America, a free speech organization that opposes book banning and has been tracking efforts to remove books from school and public library shelves for several years, said that Utah’s actions mark the first time a state has required all of its schools to remove specific titles from circulation.
The state board has said it is communicating to local educational agencies (LEAs) what their obligations are under the law.
“As far as the state board is concerned, we follow the law, we are facilitating what the law asks us to do,” Davina Sauthoff, the Utah State Board of Education’s library media specialist, told Salt Lake City FOX affiliate KSTU. “I know there’s different perceptions and viewpoints out there, but my goal is to help LEAs implement the law in the best way.
“Once I’ve done that, I want to continue to support school libraries and librarians who serve our students in developing literacy and a love of reading,” Dauthoff added. “And so that’s where I focus. I try not to get into the nitty-gritty of the camps and different viewpoints, I want to support librarians who serve our students.”
While the law does not apply to public libraries, employees of those facilities note that they have a different process for dealing with book challenges, with some expressing alarm that the state board’s actions are just imposing a new form of censorship.
Other critics fear that it may open the door to laws dictating what books public libraries may house.
For example, in Iowa, Republican lawmakers have already proposed a law that would prosecute public librarians who allow children to check out books that allegedly contain “obscene material,” even forcing librarians to register as sex offenders.
“So many of these books that are being challenged or removed are by BIPOC authors or are showing off the LGBTQIA+ experience,” Quinn Smith, the Salt Lake City Public Library’s assistant director of marketing and communications, told KSTU.
“And so when you take those out of schools, you’re limiting what children can see, whether that’s having that empathetic experience or seeing themselves reflected, and that can be harmful either way and it is a slippery slope, like to start seeing what else is going to be removed in the future.”
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