The board of education in a Maryland county has decided to re-consider a ban on books, citing parental concern that “discernment is important.”
Carroll County Public Schools Board of Education will be reviewing more than 50 books that have been removed from library shelves and that some parents feel should be banned. The books parents feel should be banned contain “explicit and really detailed” content that cannot even be read during school board meetings, Kit Hart, the head of Moms for Liberty in Carroll County, a group that stands up for parental rights, told WBALTV11.
“I think some level of discernment is important, so I’d be for them assessing whether or not the material is age-appropriate,” James Green, a parent told the outlet.
Carroll County's board of education is set to begin reviewing more than 50 books 📚 parents have deemed inappropriate @moms4Liberty @CCPSk12 pic.twitter.com/74Li9M0pph
— TIM TOOTEN SR (@tvtooten) September 12, 2023
Each month the school board will look into five books to reconsider and allow members of the public to provide their feedback, according to the outlet.
“People have said, ‘How can you define pornography and what’s the answer there?’ I know it when I see it,” Hart explained to the outlet. “It’s content that’s so explicit and really detailed that we could not read it at school board meetings, and if we had read passages, there are going to be people in the meeting who get very offended.”
Some of the books that are reportedly being considered to be banned are “Sex Is a Funny Word: A Book about Bodies, Feelings, and YOU,” “House of Earth and Blood,” “It Ends With Us,” “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West,” and “A Clash of Kings,” according to the outlet.
The school board is set to meet Wednesday evening.
Book banning has become a heated topic across the nation as some parents argue that children shouldn’t be exposed to sexually explicit content.
Republican Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey wrote a letter to the Alabama Public Library Service requesting answers regarding “sexually suggestive” books found in the children’s subject and regarding the environment in libraries for young children and families.
Meanwhile, Democratic politicians such as Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy have expressed opposition to book bans. Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom is reportedly set to sign legislation limiting what books schools can ban.
