Since Donald Trump's victory in the American presidential election, the BookTok community, this part of the Chinese social network where we talk about our readings, has been divided.
According to the American media Wired, just a few hours after the announcement of the results, “People started unsubscribing from accounts of bookmakers whose opinions did not match theirs. These were most often people who expressed support for Trump.”
Video explanation.
In an article from October 24, -, the Canadian public broadcaster, explains the mechanism behind the book bans in American public schools – more than 10,000 in the 2023-2024 school year, according to PEN America, an association defending freedom of expression.
“An unprecedented figure which has tripled in the space of a year”explains -. In fact, during the 2021-2022 school year, there were 2,532 bans, and 3,362 in 2022-2023.
School districts are administered by a school board made up of elected officials. “In principle, a parent can follow a procedure to challenge a book with their school board, and the school board must submit this content to an evaluation committee,” explains -.
Conservative groups like Moms for Liberty, Citizens Defending Freedom or No Left Turn in Education have understood this mechanism and encourage parents to use it.
“Parmi ses initiatives, Moms for Liberty [groupe conservateur] runs a website that ranks books according to their level of obscenity, and highlights passages considered inappropriate. An action plan offered to parents explains how to use these extracts to have these books removed from the school their children attend. Critics of the organization point out that these passages are presented without considering the work as a whole.”
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The number of protests has therefore increased radically in recent years. The books noted, “in the vast majority, feature queer characters, talk about racism or characters of color, or deal with sexual violence against women”, says Kasey Meehan, director of the Freedom to Read program at PEN America.
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