Happy Friday, Rulers! I recently spent some time in my home state of South Carolina, where one of the country’s most restrictive book bans recently took effect. This week, I spoke with women on both sides of this nationwide issue about how young women and girls are impacted. Let’s get into it. South Carolina is the latest state to implement a policy mandating books be removed from school library shelves if they contain descriptions of “sexual conduct.” Regulation 43-170, drafted by the state’s education department and State Superintendent Ellen Weaver, went into effect Aug. 1. South Carolina is one of several states with laws and policies that either ban books or apply pressure on local districts to remove books. Other states include Virginia, Utah, Missouri, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Georgia, Iowa, Texas and Florida — where Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a law limiting book challenges in April. “The purpose of this regulation is to bring uniformity, transparency, and consistency to the selection of instructional materials in South Carolina schools,” Jason Raven, media relations director for the South Carolina Department of Education, says in a statement. He continues, “This Regulation aligns with Supreme Court precedent and state law, focusing on the removal of inappropriate sexual material, as clearly defined in longstanding state law, from public school classrooms and libraries.” Advocates who oppose the book bans argue they’re particularly harmful for young people of color, LGBTQ+ people and young women and girls of all races. And now, as a record number of school districts face challenges and bans on library books, women on both sides of the issue are speaking out. On the side opposing the bans is Shiwali Patel, the director of safety in schools for the National Women’s Law Center, who tells Women Rule that removing books from school libraries can stifle stories by sexual assault survivors. “We're seeing bans on content about sexual violence often being folded into … state laws or policies that allow books to be pulled from shelves from schools that they're considered to be ‘sexually explicit’ or ‘pornographic,’” Shiwali says. Then there’s Tiffany Justice, the co-founder of Moms for Liberty, a parental rights organization, who argues book bans protect students from “sexually graphic content in schools.” “Parents should be having conversations with their children to help them to understand that there are people that are groomers and predators in the world in general … as evidenced in a lot of these books,” Justice tells Women Rule. She continues, “There are adults who do horrible things to kids. We should do a hell of a lot better as a society to protect those children from having those incidents happen to them … than [throwing] a book on a library shelf and hope that they stumble upon it in a public school.” School libraries that include books exploring sexual assault and consent help foster important conversations among young people, according to Sabrina Baêta, a program director at PEN America, a free speech advocacy organization. Baêta points to books like “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison and “Sold” by Patricia McCormick — both books on PEN America and the American Library Association’s top banned book list of 2023. Both were challenged for their depictions of sex and rape. “It’s important that these books offer soft introductions for ... a lens for women to understand their own experiences,” she says. “The book is not the issue. Having the book available isn't going to cause it; it's going to prevent it." Justice also adds that books pulled from school libraries will still be available in public libraries for local communities to still read. “No one's banning any books. Write the book, print the book, publish the book, sell the book, put the book in the public library,” Justice says. “[Moms for Liberty] is talking about a public school library. There is a finite amount of space; there is a finite amount of money.” But last year, a report from the American Library Association found that book challenges also were on the rise in public libraries across the country. The number of titles targeted for censorship at public libraries skyrocketed 92 percent over the previous year, accounting for about 46 percent of all book challenges in 2023, the report says. While several states have enacted laws to ban books, others have taken the opposite approach. Last year, Illinois became the first state to ban book bans. This year, Washington, Minnesota and Maryland’s state legislatures also passed laws banning book bans. Meanwhile, in Colorado, Democratic state Sen. Lisa Cutter tells Women Rule she’s trying to get a similar law passed in her state. “Librarians are trained professionals,” Cutter says. “We have to trust that they're not going to go and put things in categories that are inappropriate for age levels. Just like any profession, you have to have some level of trust, and that there's checks and balances in place.” Cutter’s bill requires anyone who challenges a book at a public or school library to be a district resident. Cutter says this was to help crack down on book challenges that came from outside the state of Colorado. Her bill also capped the amount of times a book could be challenged within a certain timeframe. While the bill did not pass this session, Cutter introduced a similar bill, but one that aims to curb book bans in public libraries — and that legislation passed. Cutter says she plans to reintroduce the school book ban legislation next session. “It’s really important to all of us, particularly young women, any marginalized people … that maybe doesn't have anyone to talk to, or doesn't have any good role models. Books open up worlds for people. And so I think intellectual freedom is incredibly important,” Cutter says. But supporters of book challenges feel differently. Justice argues that more parental oversight and collaboration with school boards would help parents to be more involved “in every aspect of their child’s lives.” “Parents are the number one driver of student success,” Justice says. “Public schools should be rolling out the red carpet for parents, helping them to engage and be involved in every aspect of their children's lives.”
| 
