this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2023
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The biggest problem with the Trans specific community is that there's a lot of hesitation from within and surrounding allies to call out the crazy stuff that's being pushed. Most people are okay, for example, with queer books being in schools. Most people are not okay with pornography in certain books. Can't we push queer books that talk about age-appropriate sexuality without pictures of people giving blow jobs to strap-ons? My mom would have had a fit if she found anything like that between straight couples in my school library.
So, it comes out that some books contain this explicit material, and instead of the queer activists/supporters saying: "Alright, yeah, this material shouldn't be here. How about replacing them with these queer books that don't contain explicit material?" They said: "fuck you, there's nothing wrong with this, you're just a bigoted transphobe."
That's where we're losing a lot of support. Because most people draw a line at explicit material for those underage. If they physically see that it's there, and advocates are shouting that it's not there (and if it is there, that it's a good thing anyway 🙄) then rational supporters are going to take a big step back and say "whoa, that's going too far." And you're going to get some who say: "yeah, let's take it all out, at least until we can be sure the explicit stuff is gone." The tactic of denying that the explicit stuff exists in the face of reality does not work. It causes people to pull away instead of supporting the overall goal.
What pornographic books with strapons are you talking about
Yeah, I'd like specific examples, this sounds like a strawman.
Gender Queer has over 200 pages, and in it there is this one scene on one page. According to https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2023/gender-queer-book-in-elementary-schools/ it was never recommended for kids. Maybe it was in some school libraries in the 16+ section or whatever, which can be argued how age appropriate that is, but pragmatically, at that age they've probably seen way worse.
It's no wonder that people are called bigots over this if their approach is totally in bad faith; they don't want a constructive discussion, it's just performative outrage and virtue signalling.
Just because some of them have "probably seen worse" does not mean we should allow sexually explicit materials in school that are not strictly textbook in nature. And as a freshman in high school at 14, I had access to all the books, no matter what age grouping they were in.
I'm not sure what bad faith about it. The characters sext each other at one point, where one talks about explicit sex acts they want to do, and there's images of one sucking on a strapon the other is wearing. You can argue that you think this material is okay for all high schoolers (most would disagree), but claiming those who are LGBT members or supporters are just trying to start somthing in bad faith isnt the truth.
I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on the following books:
IT - Stephen King
Memoirs of a Geisha
A clockwork orange
Forever - Judy Blume
The Gossip Girl Series
The Song of Ice and Fire books
That's a small list of some very popular books I'm personally aware of with sexually explicit content, some of it very violent. They're readily available in many school libraries. Clockwork orange is even studied in some high schools. The reason people are saying you're arguing in bad faith is because the nature of the bans are deliberately targeted at LGBT content. There are plenty of other books with much worse content and you're not seeing a national movement to ban that content. Hence the push-back.
I've only ever read ASOIAF and Memoiars of a geisha from that list. I don't remember how explicit scenes were in Memoairs, so I'd have to go back and re-read, but from my memory the scenes were not graphic in detail like the books above. I don't think ASOIAF should be in school libraries at all, and I'd be onboard with removing those too.
The focus on these books being lbgt has some context behind it. When quarantine happened, parents suddenly had an open door into what was being taught in classrooms. To be clear, this wasn't all teachers and all classrooms, but it turns out that there were some classrooms that were teaching things that parents weren't happy about, and it was happening across the country. A lot of this material was centered around "anti racism" which was highly prejudiced and discriminatory in nature, and LGBT teachings that lots of parents found to be inappropriate (which, for the most part, probably came from religious parents).
Whether it's fair or not, this caused parents to zoom in on these specific categories of material. These categories are being examined with a fine-toothed comb, which is why they're in the spotlight.
The problem is the whataboutism you're displaying here. "What about these books?" You're right that there are most likely inappropriate books in schools that aren't categorized as lgbt, and I do think you'd have an avenue or removing them, if they're on the level that these are sexually. But you completely cut off that option by doubling down that the books originally ousted should remain. "These aren't that bad, other books are worse" isn't a reasonable argument when people can see them with their own eyes and see that they are. Also, I'd love for you to discover any other book in a school library that instructs teens on how to make their own pornography, which, besides the obvious tie in to child porn, would label these kids themselves as sexual preditors and put them on the list.
You could easily make these arguments if we replaced these specific books with LGBT ones that are sexually appropriate. Why is that not an option? Why are you arguing to keep a book in these schools that instruct 14-17 year olds how to make their own porn?
It's staggering to me that you'd die on this hill. Rational parents now see two options: either the sexually explicit material remains, or all queer material is banned. They're not seeing a rational pushback against that second option, so they're going to go with that second option. The doubling down is in fear that all queer books will eventually be banned from schools. Well guess what: it's happening because you're doubling down. You started this argument with "its not happening" and now your argument is "its happening, but it's not that bad." You're actively pushing for a queer book ban, you're just going the long way to do it.
There are, I'm assuming, plenty of queer books without these explicit pictures and instructions? Why aren't those being championed instead?
I did in response to another commenter.
The books aren't pornographic in their whole, but they have pornographic material in them. The two that have gotten major publicity are:
Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe. Where the described strap-on blowing scene is from. It also has explicit sexting scenes where a character describes how hot certain sexual acts would be. I have no problem with coming-of-age stories for queer people, and I have no problem with books with this kind of material being in public libraries. For high schools, you want to talk about/show queer people kissing? Cool. Want them to talk about having sex in general? Cool. But those explicit scenes should probably not be in school libraries. Keep them to general community libraries and let parents decide what's appropriate to read beyond what's school-appropriate.
Trans Bodies, Trans Selves by Laura Erickson Schroth. While again, I think a lot of good can come from seeing pictures of normal, naked bodies not in a state of arousal, the book goes beyond that in sections, discussing ways in which to search for trans porn, or to make trans porn youself.
And listen, I have no issues with porn. Most of us find it online when we're young anyway. But that doesnt mean it should be offered how to navigate it, or how to start doing it yourself in school, even in high schools. Most people, including most people in the LBGT+ communities agree that there's a line to draw here. Leave it up to individual parents to decide how to manage what their kids come into contact with.
These two books caused a firestorm, and when it was shown what had parents upset, instead of saying: "here are some alternatives that have the same themes with no explicit content" activists said: "fuck you, you're lying" or "fuck you, there's nothing wrong with showing this."
Such a dumb response, because it pushes rational people away who see/hear that response and think: "wtf, why are they denying what I'm seeing with my own eyes?" Or "of course there's something wrong with teenagers in high school reading text about how to make their own porn, these activists are crazy". It literally ensures there's going to be a bigger backlash and they'll start going overboard.
I don't like the source I have, by the way. It's incredibly politically biased and one sided, but it's the only site that lists the explicit parts. I also need to point out that I don't agree with everything that's listed in this writeup as being bad. I think talking about what goes into being a trans person is a good thing, and would 100% be on board with these books in high schools if the sexuality explicit stuff weren't in them. Source.
Like, there have to be queer books out there that are actually age-appropriate, right? Why aren't we pushing those?
it comes across as bigoted lies because nearly every time, even the most reasonable sounding arguments contain blatant misinformation at best and lies at worst
framing gender queer as porn because it includes one sex scene is just slightly less ridiculous than framing stephen king's 'it' as porn
its hard to take your comment as sincere when the most genuine and reasonable speech folks can muster still relies on distorting the truth
its also hard to take concerned citizens as genuinely concerned when their concern only ever seems to kick in when it lets them yell about the alphabet people
Okay, so what about the hooks and my post is misinformation or lies? Seeing examples of the exact problematic pages shows you its true and the information is correct.
I didn't say gender queer as a whole is porn, but there are sections in it that are pornographic in nature. To be clear: These scenes would still be an issue if it were a book about straight people.
It makes no sense not to just replace it with queer books and stories that don't contain this sexually explicit stuff.
You can find concrete examples in another comment i made on this thread. They were found in high schools, so ages 14-18. Most people don't have any problem with these books being in any library that aren't school libraries. Leave it up to the parents to decide on their own terms how they handle their children's access. But get the sexuality explicit stuff out of schools.
Most people would have the same issue if it were books about straight people that had this material in schools.
Looks like the Lemmy community has decided to use the voting system like reddit did in the end. An agreement vote, not an 'adding to discussion' vote.
Here we go again!
That's not a reddit or lemmy thing. That's a human thing.
What's explicit about somebody licking a piece of plastic? I think teenagers draw worse things on their desks.
I would just like to point out that I do think this is a very reasonable take even if you're being downvoted. Perhaps there's no literal books of people blowing strap-ons, perhaps plenty of people don't consider that inappropriate for children. But it's never unreasonable to try to understand your "opponents" in a battle, and even perhaps come to compromise. Most social movements start by asking for a lot, then dialing back to more "agreeable" terms. Sure, the fight isn't over yet, but a battle being won is still important.
Hey thanks. It's okay, I knew my comment would not be popular, haha. There's definitely a litteral book with the strap on part, and a book that teaches you how to find specific porn and how to make it yourself. I listed them in a comment below.
I think we should definitely have queer representation in the books in our schools libraries. I don't see how pushing to keep ones with explicit material is going to help keep that representation there. If anything, it's going to cause a bigger pushback. We could have easily replaced them with school appropriate material instead.