After two hours of public comment, the Nexa School Board voted Thursday night to ban two books from their high school shelves and restrict another.
At their regular meeting, the council was charged with deciding the fate of three of the sixteen books challenged by the Fathers. Among these, the bizarre memoirs “Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic” and “All Boys Arn’t Blue: A Memoir-Manifesto” were banned.
The third book, “Homegoing” is restricted – which means it will be made available to the student with parental permission but will not be placed on high school shelves.
“Fun Home” is Alison Bechdel’s award-winning illustrated memoir – telling the story of her childhood as a lesbian and the strained relationship with her homosexual and closed father.
Parent Carissa Corson has requested that the book be removed due to its graphic sexual content.
“Totally unsuitable for minors! Your online catalog even says ‘includes adult content’. This book contains pornography.”
According to Corson, the alleged pornography includes full frontal male genitalia, oral sex scenes, child sexual abuse, grooming, and topless women.
Corson also filed a complaint against “All Boys Are Not Blue,” George M. Johnson’s memoir – telling the story of his childhood as a black and grotesque child.
According to Corson, the book contains “pictorial” oral and anal sex and “all copies must be removed.”
“Homegoing” depicts a series of vignettes by several generations of one family brought to America in the transatlantic slave trade.
Of the 16 books, seven have been restricted—including “Homecoming”—two have been banned, and seven have yet to be adjudicated.
Before the vote, school board members stressed the importance of civility and hearing the debate from both sides—many of whom commented on the difficulty of their decision.
There were two hours of testimonials from parents, community members, and students. The night often turned into boos, cheers, and thunderous applause.
Sitting in the front rows were more than a dozen Nixa High School students who had come to speak against the ban.
“Students are more mature than anything else and most have the ability to deal with the complex topics or topics presented in these books. Slavery, racism and other issues are examples of the mature topics students learn in elementary and middle school. By the time students reach high school,” he said Nixa Jr. Justice Jones: “They can navigate these topics on their own without guidance from a teacher or a parent.”
Jones added that parents now have the right to prevent their children from viewing objectionable books from the school library.
“Although these books may not be suitable for all students, it is unfair to restrict the choice to each student,” Jones said. “Whether or not a student reads a particular book is a matter between them and their parents only.”
The students collected 316 signatures from their classmates requesting that the books remain in the library.
“These signatures represent students of all classes, races, and ethnicities, who believe they would benefit from unrestricted access to these books in the library,” Jones said.
Several parents at the meeting argued that all books should be removed from the shelves – calling it porn.
“Excerpts from these books are so outrageous and frank, they would defeat the purpose of our assignment to read them aloud in front of the palace,” said Corson.
Along with several other speakers at the meeting, Corson called for the Nixa High School librarian to resign to allow these books to enter the school.
“If (the school board) votes to keep these books on the shelf, you belong on a national registry. I would call for the resignation of the Nixa High School librarian,” Corson said to boos and boos from both sides. .
“They abuse their power to expose our children to pornographic books and instead of apologizing, they double down and put their seal of approval on them. They too belong to a national registry.”
Later in the meeting, the Nixa School students in attendance declared their support for the librarian – saying they would stand in solidarity with them if they were expelled.
When another speaker called for the librarian to resign, one of the students loudly booed, interrupting the speaker. Before the board could reconvene in order, another person shouted at the booing student, “Oh shut up!”