An award-winning author went to Central Bucks to protest proposed book bans, including of one of her own

The Central Bucks School District’s policy prohibiting “sexualized content” in school libraries has reportedly led to more than 60 book challenges and protest over potential censorship.

On Tuesday, the author of one of the books targeted for removal added her voice to the opposition — telling the district’s school board it will be committing “educational malpractice” if books reflecting abuse endured by children are removed from district libraries.

“Our children are already hurt. They need us to have the courage to talk about the hard things, to make a safe place for them to say what happened to them,” said Laurie Halse Anderson, a New York Times-bestselling author who lives in Upper Dublin Township and last week won Sweden’s Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, the world’s largest award for children’s literature.

Anderson, whose 1999 breakthrough novel, Speak, told the story of a teenage survivor of sexual assault, published a memoir in 2019, Shout, about her own experience being raped at 13. Shout is among a list of books facing review and possible removal from Central Bucks libraries, according to district employees.

“I know firsthand how hard it can be to speak up when bad things happen. Bad things happen to our kids much more than any of us want to admit,” Anderson said, addressing the board during public comment.

She cited data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that 14% of high school girls in 2021 reported they had been forced to have sex, along with 4% of high school boys. And 18% of high school girls and 5% of high school boys reported they had experienced sexual violence — including forced kissing or touching — within the last year.

Anderson said that “not reading books, not talking about sexual violence, or healthy consent-based sexuality, pulls all that and puts it underneath a lid.”

Over opposition from community members and civil rights advocates, Central Bucks last year passed a policy prohibiting sexualized content in library books — stating that “no materials ... shall contain visual or visually implied depictions of sexual acts” or “explicit written descriptions of sexual acts.”

But regulations enacting the policy weren’t announced until January, after a review by a Harrisburg legal group focused on religious liberty that has opposed rights for transgender students. The district, which is facing a federal investigation into alleged anti-LGBTQ bias, said at the time that it had not received any challenges but had already decided to review five books — four of which center on LGBTQ characters — for possible removal due to sexualized content.

Since then, district employees have reported at least 60 books have been challenged. The district has not confirmed those challenges or announced a process for the reviews; a spokesperson did not respond to questions Wednesday.

During Tuesday’s board meeting, some community members referred to “child pornography” as they read sexually graphic passages from some of the challenged books.

“If you have any minors in the room or listening, remove them immediately as I will be showing you proof,” said Shannon Harris, who later suggested board members “research” the books on BookLooks, a website with ties to the Moms for Liberty group that lists objectionable passages and assigns ratings to books.

Parents can already opt their children out of book assignments, or specify that they cannot check out certain library books, Anderson said.

“Democracy is hard, my friends,” she said. “We have to learn how to get along with people we disagree with. You have the mechanism to keep the books in school and allow the families who don’t want their kids to read them to not have access to them.”