INDEX ON CENSORSHIP | VOL.53 | NO.2
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that school says that no child can see that book because one parent has written a complaint,” she said.
She was supported by senior members of staff and others, but she lost her position regardless.
In another school, a parent suggested that a specific book be restricted to older children, and Amy was happy to oblige. But the decision was made that the book should be removed completely.
“It seems that when it comes down to it, if a parent complains, the book’s gone,” she said.
Another anonymous school library service worker, who we’ll refer to as David, said that his organisation received complaints about LGBT+ content from all faiths, and explained that while headteachers were generally supportive, they haven’t got the tools to formulate a defence.
He told Index that policies from groups such as CILIP and the SLA made no impact without a supportive school, describing a landscape where headteachers wanted to take the path of least resistance to shut down complaints. That usually means censorship.
“It’s a very small minority of parents, sometimes just one or two, who want to kick up a fuss because they basically say for whatever reason, whether it’s personal, social or religious, ‘I don’t want my child accessing this content’.
“And it’s trying to get that message out saying, ‘OK, you don’t want your child accessing this content, but you can’t shut it down for everyone else,’” he said.
The books were hidden from sight and a handful of them have permanently vanished
“I think people are worried about upsetting certain groups,” he said, explaining how there are some Muslim and Christian parents in his area who don’t want their children exposed to LGBT+ characters. But, he stressed, these groups are not homogenous.
“We haven’t even got a central government that’s going to address this,” David said, speaking in April 2024 before the election was called. “What we’ve got is a political climate where they’re stoking these fires.”
He described a librarian he knows in a private school who is handing out “offthe-record loans” from a back cupboard.
“There’s nothing inappropriate. It’s just stuff that they know the parents will disagree with,” he said. In another private school, a parent tried to get a librarian sacked because their child had been reading an LGBT+ book.
In some cases, the censorship is more subtle. The SLA told Index that it has had reports of senior staff having a quiet word with librarians, telling them to keep particular books on the shelves but not to include them in displays.
“It also very much puts that librarian in a difficult position, because the children who need those books are only ever going to get them if they’re directly signposted to them,” the SLA’s Tarrant said.
Gwen works in a school library service, supporting around 420 schools. She said that most of the book challenges the service faced were from secondary schools, and were usually based on the label given to a book or its content.
On one occasion, when it was running a book award for Year 8 pupils (12 to 13-year-olds), it was challenged on the inclusion of some books, including one with a minor LGBT+ element. One secondary Catholic school decided not to give that book to its students.
That same school refused to have a book which promoted open conversation around menstruation.
“Probably more of the challenges may come in from our Catholic secondaries,” Gwen told Index. “And
ABOVE: Parents protest outside a school in Birmingham over children being taught about LGBT+ identities we still have some Catholic primaries who don’t have Harry Potter and books like that on their shelves.”
But, she explained, the service has a robust policy, and encourages schools to do the same. It also runs seminars on how to tackle censorship attempts.
“I think it’s just slight challenges,” she said. “I think parents are challenging schools more and more about lots of different things. So, it isn’t just censorship.”
Gwen isn’t as worried about censorship as some of the other library professionals we spoke to.
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