Controversy brewing over gay sex ed book at Wasilla library

http://www.frontiersman.com/news/controversy-brewing-over-gay-sex-ed-book-at-wasilla-library/article_03db473a-90af-11e5-947b-47be66ddd523.html

WASILLA — A committee has been formed to evaluate the appropriateness of a Wasilla Public Library book intended for gay teens that more than one parent says is “sexually explicit.”

On a trip to the library in September, Wasilla resident Vanessa Campbell’s 10-year-old son found a book with a rainbow cover titled, “This Book is Gay,” by U.K. young adult author James Dawson. Concerned about the content and the placement of the book in a bookcase labeled “Government” in the juvenile nonfiction section of the library, Campbell took it to Wasilla Public Library Director Kathy “KJ” Martin-Albright.

“I felt it was too sexually explicit to have in the younger section,” Campbell said Friday.

Chapter titles in the book range from “Coming Out” to “The ins and outs of gay sex,” the latter of which seemed to cause the most disturbance among Campbell and friends to whom she showed photocopied pages. “The ins and outs,” section, for example, includes detailed descriptions of how to appreciate anal sex, such as the following:

“With the right water-based lube, however, it can be hugely enjoyable — a good kind of pain like a deep tissue massage,” reads a sentence on page 177.

Other passages include how-to examples.

"Oral sex is popping another dude's peen in your mouth or, indeed, popping yours in his," explains the book.

The American Library Association labels Young Adult books as those appropriate to ages 12 to 18, and Juvenile books as those appropriate for readers age 8 to 12. While fiction books in each category are in separate sections of the lower level of the Wasilla library, nonfiction gets lumped together, Martin-Albright said.

Campbell was not satisfied with this, saying that the book was too accessible to “kids not ready to see this stuff.” She also took the author to task for using “really improper, borderline vulgar” slang in place of  “correct anatomical terms” to describe sex, and claimed it went beyond so-called education, focusing more on “intrigue” and “enticement.”

After discussing these concerns with Martin-Albright, Campbell was encouraged to fill out a “Reconsideration of Materials” form, which asks the patron eight questions, including, “what are your objections to this material?”

Campbell said her objection was more about placement than content, the latter of which cannot constitute grounds for the removal of a book anyway, according to library policy.

“I’m not challenging this book at all because it’s addressed to LGBTQ people,” she said. “It just shouldn’t be in the mix with children’s books.”

Martin-Albright said she spent the next two weeks reading the book and reading reviews of the book in publications such as Publisher’s Weekly and School Library Journal, as per the library’s Reconsideration of Materials policy. (Reading reviews in such publications is part of the initial selection process when purchasing books for the library as well, but more reviews of an individual book, when questioned by a patron, must be located).

When the allotted research period was up, Martin-Albright denied Campbell’s request to move the book to the adult section of the library.

“It was my determination that keeping it in the juvenile nonfiction section is what was appropriate for it,” Martin-Albright said Friday.

She did say, however, that the book could probably be moved to the health and medicine subsection rather than the social sciences — currently labeled “Government” — since it focuses at least as much on sex and sexuality as culture and social issues.

Campbell appealed the decision, resulting in the formation of a Reconsideration Committee, which library policy requires to consist of “a representative from the Friends of the Wasilla Public Library, a professional in the local literary community, and a community school librarian.”

Crowding the committee

Once the committee was formed and a meeting date set (Nov. 19), Campbell penned a letter to Martin-Albright stating what she said was her intention to bring a few friends for moral support.

“I am aware of numerous individuals that are dissatisfied with this finding. We will present our findings before the newly established Reconsideration Committee,” she wrote.

Though not considered or advertised as a public meeting by the City of Wasilla, Martin-Albright said the committee initially decided to allow some extra people in as a courtesy to those who had contacted the city directly to express their concerns.

“This is a committee meeting and while we welcome the public to attend, committee meetings are not open to public comment,” reads a statement on the typed agenda.

But when more than 15 people showed up, Martin-Albright, the committee, and city officials decided the courtesy was no longer appropriate.

“It was not conducive to holding the hearing appropriately,” she said.

Martin-Albright added that the number of people present was not ultimately significant anyway.

“Since the decision is based on the merits of work, it shouldn’t matter,” she said.

Nevertheless, other patrons have said they now want their voices heard about the book.

 

Going public

 

Campbell has encouraged others to voice their opinion on the matter during the regularly scheduled period of public testimony at Monday’s 6 p.m. Wasilla City Council meeting. Although the Reconsideration Committee’s proceedings aren’t on the council's agenda, Campbell said she hopes city officials will take her opinion and that of others into consideration before the new library opens next fall.

Jessica Cox, one of Campbell’s friends who showed up to the Thursday meeting, is another library patron who decried the “explicit content” of the book.

“I think it just crosses the line, it’s very crass, it’s not educational,” Cox said. “There are such things as educational sex ed books, and there are school teachers that teach sex ed in a well-mannered way, but this is just over the top.”

When presented with photocopied pages of the book in the Wasilla library on Friday, Palmer resident Amanda Taylor — who said she hadn’t heard of the book before — was shocked to learn of the book’s existence in a shelf not far from where her 8-year-old daughter was browsing.

“I didn’t even consider that kind of book would be in the kids’ section of a library,” she said. “I don’t wanna censor people, but at the same time, as a parent, that’s not something I want my kid looking at.”

Taylor added that she figured her child would ask about sex and homosexuality eventually, but that it’s strictly a family issue.

“If a parent wants to discuss that with their kids, great, but it’s not up to a public library to teach children about that,” she said.

In an email to the Frontiersman, the author argued that children will find a way to access such material through other means — better they find it in his book than elsewhere, he said.

“If parents think internet savvy young adults aren’t aware of what consenting adults do in bed, they’re kidding themselves,” Dawson wrote. “Would they rather they saw it in pornography or would they rather they took a responsible, sensible non-fiction title out of a library?”

Dawson also doesn't shy away from discussing politics in the book.

"Is there anything icky about gay sex?" he writes in one passage. "I challenge any politician to discuss this with me. I WILL RUIN THEM."

Placement a moot point?

In the new library, Martin-Albright said, all nonfiction — regardless of targeted age range — will exist in the same section, “a documented library best practice.” In part, it has to do with minimizing discrimination of a patron based on reading level.

“Adults who have limited reading skills don’t feel comfortable going into a children’s section to get materials or information, even though it might be more appropriate and easier for them to understand those. But they will browse everything interfiled, and it’s the same with accelerated readers.”

Martin-Albright said the books will be labeled with a “J” for juvenile or “YA” for Young Adult. Campbell and Cox said they’re equally “concerned about that.”

As for the immediate decision on where to place “This Book is Gay,” Martin-Albright said the committee will make a decision by Dec. 6.

Contact reporter Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.

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