WILSON COUNTY SCHOOLS REMOVES 400+ BOOKS THANKS TO GOP LAW

At the start of the school year there were reports that Wilson County Schools would start the year with their library closed as they worked to comply with the new state Republican “Age Appropriate Materials Law”. Wilson Schools explained:

“We will fully comply, and the process to remove materials will happen in a productive and expedited process.”

So what does the law say? From the Tennessean:

“The legislation prohibits materials containing nudity or describes or depicts sexual excitement, sexual conduct, excess violence or sadomasochistic abuse, according to state obscenity laws. It also mandates material that “appeals to the “prurient interest” should not be considered appropriate for school age students.”

Obviously wildly broad, vague, and confusingly up for interpretation.

And what does compliance look like in Wilson County? Now we know.

400+ books have been removed from Wilson County Schools libraries. Here’s The List, which we understand will be presented at the Wilson County School Board meeting Thursday Night at 6pm.

Maybe parents should show up and make their voices heard.

5 of the books were removed from elementary schools, nearly 40 from Middle School, and the rest, nearly 350, from High School libraries.

The list includes classics like Slaughterhouse 5, Pinkalicious, Ready Player One – there’s really something for everyone on the banned list.

To make sure they are in compliance and not open librarians and teachers up to liability, Wilson Schools is understandably making sure nothing remotely edgy is available to students, who Republicans believe are unable to handle books that have been in school libraries for decades.

Sad. Is this really the world we want for our kids? A world where libraries are devoid of anything challenging? How will this prepare them for an inevitably challenging world?

It’s important to keep in mind these book bans are part of a much bigger push to villainize our public schools, with a focus on librarians – part of a privatization effort that ends with billions of dollars landing in the pockets of private church schools and privately run charter schools, which has been Governor Lee’s main priority since the day he took office.

Lee’s rigged charter appeal board, the TISA funding overhaul, the push for universal vouchers – all of this is an effort to villainize public schools and make it easier for kids to leave, taking public taxpayer dollars with them over to privately run religiously affiliated schools and charter schools.

That’s the backdrop here. This book ban law gives the impression our librarians and schools have been peddling pornography, which is anything but the case. Obscene books are already illegal in our schools. The difference is now we have the Rep. Susan Lynn and Senator Mark Podys of the world deciding what ALL of our kids can read. How is that parental choice?

Rutherford County and other counties are also banning books over the vague legislation, which has drawn criticism that includes PEN America’s Freedom to Read Director Kasey Meehan, called  “draconian.”

Book bans are now the norm in Tennessee. Is this really what we want to be known for? Hard to find a time in history where the book banners were on the right side of it.

JC Bowman of the Professional Educators of Tennessee tells us:

“The law creates more problems than it solves.”

There have been questions about whether the new legislation would apply to the Bible, since the Bible includes a ton of violence, terror, rape, and even depicts 2 daughters getting their father drunk and raping him.

But all that is totally fine, according to the bill’s Republican sponsor Susan Lynn: “any standard in Tennessee, the Bible has always been acceptable.”

Sure, Susan.