There is no need for sexual content in children’s books. Any books that are not age appropriate should be segregated, if not removed from all public and school libraries.
The Columbia County Library Board made the right call with its reshelving policy, which was further upheld by the Regional Board this past Tuesday. Despite passionate pleas on both sides of the issue, common sense won the day.
Elected officials represent the people and are ultimately responsible to the public. It is the public that makes the decision on what is appropriate. If you disagree with the majority of the community on this, you can start your protest with a vote. But feel free to end it with a U-Haul. Columbia County’s elected leaders appointed people to the library board who made a decision, and they made the right decision with the policy change.
Parents have the right to regulate what content their children are exposed to. If a parent is unhappy with the library, or school system for that matter, the parent can choose to homeschool their child or not go to the public library. On the other side if a parent really wants their child to be exposed to what many would call smut or inappropriate for some ages, that is their right. One parent’s rights can’t infringe on another.
Public libraries are a privilege, not a right.
The crux of the argument is not whether inappropriate books should be reshelved in a library, but if they should be there in the first place. I tend to error on the side of caution here. If a book is questionable, then remove it. There are plenty of good books that are appropriate, that offer both entertainment, educational value and promote scholastic growth. Smut isn’t needed just because the surrounding culture sees fit to shove it down peoples throats every chance they get.
Children do not naturally want to read books about social justice, racism or LGBTQ topics. The only reason a child would end up reading one of those books is by accident or if prompted by an adult.
The only reason any adult could want a child to read books on these those topics is if they want to indoctrinate the child into a radical leftist ideology. As a parent they have the right to do that to their child, but they do not have the right to impose their crazy on the rest society.
By leaving these inappropriate books mixed in with “Green Eggs and Ham” or “Watership Down” (two of my favorite books), the leftist agenda-driven people are hoping that children will pick them up by accident or out of curiosity resulting in the child questioning the values and principles their parents have promoted.
The argument about censorship is laughable. If you don’t know if a book is age appropriate, then I question the quality of the public education you received and your decision to place your child back into that perpetual cesspool of mediocre learning. If you know a book isn’t age appropriate and you still want young children to read it, then you are on a slippery slope headed for a loud crash into pedophilia.
Censorship reminds me of the famous quote from Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart. Stewart was asked to define obscenity, but instead famously said about obscenity, “I know it when I see it.”
In this case, you know it when you read it.
Any book that promotes same sex relationships or LGBTQ principles is inappropriate for children of any age. Those books have no place in our school system or public libraries period. Anything that is LGBTQ-themed is “sexual” in nature. After all, each letter represents some deviation away from the Judeo-Christian ethical definition of what gender, sex and marriage is. Sexual content is not needed to promote healthy reading habits. Children are exposed to enough sexual content today without them finding in a library.
I applaud the library boards for standing up for common sense and defending decency. To those who believe these questionable books are appropriate for children and no age restrictions should be placed on content out of a fear of censorship, I truly feel sorry for you. You have failed to prioritize protecting the young and innocent in place of promoting a political agenda and indoctrination on someone else’s children.
As for me and my household, this is one of the many reasons we choose to homeschool. We don’t go to public libraries, yet I would be willing to bet that my children read more books in a year than 90% of other children their age, and those books are age appropriate and don’t contain smut or political agendas.
Parents should never cede control of what their children are learning to any government entity or group including the public school system. Parents are ultimately responsible for their children and what they learn, and that is a daily battle against a world that wants to teach your children that everything that is right is wrong and vice versa.
