The following article from earlier in March is a reasonably fair review of the controversy over books in schools. The political narrative is 'book banning', for obvious reasons. The term is anti-American, brings up images of totalitarian regimes and carries an overall negative connotation. Matters not of course if the narrative is accurate, just that it works. And in fairness, it is a fine line to allow and not allow certain books. But this controversy is over two things, and neither is about banning books.

1. Parental involvement. For too long shadowy people have helped provide books and classroom instruction materials to our teachers. Parent, either from denied access or simply apathy have not been involved. COVID brought school curriculum home and the parents began to see what public education in the 21st century looked like, and they are rightfully appalled.
2. Books and related materials are acceptable to different age groups. As Gov DeSantis recently said, 'adults can read anything they want, not the same thing for kindergarten or kids in the 1st & 2nd grades'. Would you be happy if you teacher was making Playboy available to your first graders? Of course, not. Some of the books parents are concerned about are materials clearly over a kids head, and sexually or violently explicit.

Read the article below for an understanding of both sides. Until a year ago, Stephana Ferrell’s political activism was limited to the occasional letter to elected officials. Then came her local school board meeting in Orange County, Florida and an objection raised to Maia Kobabe’s graphic novel “Gender Queer: A Memoir.” And the county’s decision last fall to remove it from high school shelves. “By winter break, we realized this was happening all over the state and needed to start a project to rally parents to protect access to information and ideas in school,” says Ferrell, a mother of two. Along with fellow Orange County parent Jen Cousins, she founded the Florida Freedom to Read Project, which works with existing parent groups statewide on a range of educational issues, including efforts to “keep or get back books that have gone under challenge or have been banned.” More From New York Post: