John Kennedy is right: It s not anti-gay to want books such as Gender Queer removed from schools

It s absolutely true that, in some cases, the push to remove certain books from school libraries or curricula has gone too far. For example, graphic books about the Holocaust shouldn t be removed, as some have tried to do, because educating young people about the horrors of totalitarianism absolutely does require exposing them to it.

But it s also true that in none of these cases are books really being banned. Any parent can still go on Amazon and buy their child any book they want. Yet school libraries and curricula inherently have to choose some books and exclude others. This curation always happens. What s happening now is that many parents got a closer look at their children s education during the COVID-19 shutdowns and virtual learning and realized that many of these decisions were being made in ways they found objectionable.

Hence the unprecedented wave of book ban attempts in 2022. Not all of these efforts to remove specific books are justified or reasonable, to be clear. Many aren t. Each case depends on individual factors such as what the exact content is, what age level the library is for, and so on.

But there s nothing illegitimate, as Democrats seem to suggest, about the process of parents trying to influence the curation decisions made by school librarians and administrators. After all, they work for us. They use our money to buy these books, and parents have every right to have a say in their children s education.

There s also nothing inherently homophobic or anti-LGBT, despite the spin of Durbin and many others, about the push to remove certain books with LGBT themes. At least in the case of some of the most popularly challenged books such as This Book is Gay and Gender Queer, they are not merely being challenged for having a gay character or depicting gay parents, or so on. (To whatever extent that s happening, it s absolutely wrong.)

Many of these books are being challenged because they are extremely sexually graphic.

via www.washingtonexaminer.com

H/t instapundit.