In American politics, when someone wants to claim the moral high ground and declare an issue to be so sacrosanct that it shouldn’t even be up for debate, they say: “this is the civil rights issue of our time.” The Left says “trans rights are the civil rights issue of our time.” The Right says “school choice is the civil rights issue of our time.” And, as of last week, the Biden administration has all but declared that “access to porn at school is the civil rights issue of our time.”
Last year, the Biden Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) launched an investigation of Georgia’s Forsyth School District, threatening to cut off all of its federal funding. The district’s offense: deciding to temporarily remove eight books from school libraries and review them. Last week, OCR concluded its investigation and released a resolution agreement.
In the “Facts” section of the agreement, OCR says that, according to witnesses, the “books were reviewed in January 2022 for explicit sexual content, specifically graphic details of sexual acts and not just references to sex or sexual acts.” It notes that “the Superintendent had authorized the removal of sexually explicit books, making clear that the books had not been reviewed for LGBTQI+ content or moral dilemma issues, just sexual explicitness.” OCR conceded that “the District limited its book screening process to sexually explicit material” as it reviewed whether the books “should remain on the shelves despite the explicit sexual content.”
How explicit were these books—and others at the center of the nationwide “book banning” controversy? Put yourself on the review committee and you be the judge. Here are three of the books Forsyth reviewed, with relevant excerpts.
First up is L8r, G8r by Lauren Myracle (a book that has been challenged in at least 19 districts across the country).
SnowAngel: so: spit or swallow? [/] zoegirl: i swallowed, but i don’t think i’m going to next time. i’ll just tell him very politely so he’s not offended. [/] SnowAngel: erm, i bet he’ll be okay with it. what’s he gonna say, “nuh uh, no way! in that case, no blow jobs for YOU, missy!” [/] zoegirl: I don’t *want* a blow job [/] SnowAngel: you know what i mean [/] zoegirl: doug tried to go down on me (geez, that sounds dorky), but I was like ‘”no no no no no. that’s ok.” [/] SnowAngel: why? [/] zoegirl: like you said, the whole odor thing. but in reverse. ack, i’m blushing just talking about it!
John Moore/Getty Images
Next, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews (challenged in 26 districts):
“Do you even know how to eat pussy?” “Uh, not really.” “Papa Gaines never sat you down, said, Son, one day you’re gonna have to eat the pussy.” “No. But he did teach me how to eat a butthole.” … The Greg S. Gaines Three-Step Method of Seduction 1. Lurch into the girl’s bedroom pretending to be a zombie. 2. Go in for a fist pound. 3. Suggest that you habitually masturbate all over pillows.
Finally, The Infinite Moment of Us by Lauren Myracle (challenged in 8 districts):
It embarrassed her, she said, that she made noises. But Charlie loved it. His cock strained against his jeans. He pulled back slightly and used his forearm to push her legs apart. He slid his hand beneath her panties again and found the spot he was looking for—heat and wetness and skin softer than any silk or lace—and slipped two fingers inside of her.
What do you think? Appropriate for school libraries? Well, the Forsyth School District said “Yes.” The only book it prohibited was All Boys Aren’t Blue by George Johnson (challenged in 67 districts).
Maybe you think descriptions of under-age sexual activity is appropriate material for school libraries. Maybe you think that none of what’s above is appropriate. But the problem that OCR had with the Forsyth School District wasn’t what it decided, but that it considered the question at all. The “book screening process,” OCR contended, “may have created a hostile environment for students,” an environment the district did not take “responsive steps” to “ameliorate.”
It’s unclear what “responsive steps” the federal agency had in mind. But the logic behind its assertion that reviewing books for sexually explicit content creates a hostile environment is clear. It can be summed up in this syllogism: (1) LGBTQI+ students deserve to be represented in school libraries. (2) They are represented in school libraries through the explicit depiction of sex acts. Therefore (3) objecting to the explicit depiction of sex acts in school libraries constitutes hostility against LGBTQI+ students.
Or, as UC Berkeley education professor Bruce Fuller told the Washington Post, “When students are struggling with these issues of identity, and you ban books that are speaking to these kids, that does appear to violate the spirit of the letter of the civil rights law.” Fuller also declared that OCR’s settlement with Forsyth was “a quiet shot over the bow against school districts that egregiously and without due process remove books from school libraries.”
Whatever you think of the moral proposition that gay kids need access to gay porn at school, this is not actually a settled point in civil rights jurisprudence. And the settlement was not a “quiet shot,” (as evidenced by the existence of the Washington Post article) and the problem wasn’t a lack of due process.
The problem, from the Biden administration’s perspective, was that the school district temporarily removed and reviewed these books at all. The administration has sent a message to schools that if they even think about removing sexually explicit books they risk a federal investigation with its attendant threat of cutting off all federal money. The Biden team is so convinced of the moral righteousness and political expediency of its cause that it is making opposition to “book banning” a central theme in the president’s reelection campaign. Because, as of 2023, access to porn at school is the civil rights issue of our time.
Max Eden is a research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.