Attempted LGBT Book Ban Fails in Texas

This week, the town of Granbury in Hood County, Texas is the site of yet another victory for LGBT rights.

Earlier this month, dozens of Granbury residents signed challenge forms at Hood County Library, protesting the inclusion of titles that promote tolerance of the LGBT community–Cheryl Kilodavis’s My Princess Boy and Gayle E. Pitman’s This Day in June–in the children’s section. Some asked that the books be relocated to a different section; others asked that they be barred from the library.

Library Director Courtney Kincaid resisted, assenting to moving This Day in June–which focuses on a Pride parade and LGBT history to the nonfiction section, but refusing to move My Princess Boy. Said Kincaid, “The books have color drawings and have some rhymes. Lesbians and gays are in this community, and they deserve to have some items in this collection.”

And yesterday, the Hood County Commissioner’s Court declined to say differently. Following a nearly three-hour-long public meeting–at which one Hood County resident accused the library of “[hiding] their contempt for Judeo-Christian values behind the right of free speech”–the Commission chose not to vote on the issue. They cited the advice of the county attorney, who said previous cases indicated that “removing, relocating, or in any way restricting access to the books would likely constitute unlawful censorship.”

Kincaid had some advice for her thwarted neighbors: “If you don’t want your children to read these books, don’t check them out.” A reasoned response–though we’d like to compel all of the challenge form writers to take a leaf out of Pitman and Kilodavis’s books.