![]() Russel thinks he’s the only gay person at his school, and spends his days feeling horribly alone and terrified that at any time his secret might be somehow revealed, bringing with it social ostracism and possible violence. Great job, West Bend, that’s pretty much the opposite of what we need. It sounds more to me like West Bend Citizens for Safe Libraries is actually trying to “protect” teens from positive images of gay people in the misguided belief that not reading Geography Club will keep them safely heterosexual, or at least safely in the closet and depressed. The first person narrator only gets a few kisses over the course of the book, and anyone else who goes farther only mentions it rather obliquely. ![]() ![]() On the one hand, labeling all the books that mention sex WOULD make their circulation suddenly go through the roof, but on the other hand, anyone picking up Geography Club because of its supposed sexiness is going to be extremely disappointed. The West Bend Citizens for Safe Libraries campaigned for about four months to have sexually explicit materials from the young adult section moved to the adult section and labelled “as containing sexual material”. West Bend was also the community going after Baby Be-Bop, so it is possible that their definition of “pornography” is “mentioning gay people”. ![]() Challenged at: West Bend, Wisconsin Community Libraryįor: “being obscene or child pornography” in a section designated for young adults ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |