Utah's Banned Books

So I saw this Reddit thread about how books that have been banned from Utah public school libraries are now also forbidden for students to even possess on school property.

So I did a little digging. And now I’m going to do a little info dumping.

Which Books are Banned?

Here’s the list:

  • A Court of Thorns and Roses (Court of Thorns and Roses #1) - Maas, Sarah J.
  • A Court of Frost and Starlight (Court of Thorns and Roses #3.1) - Maas, Sarah J.
  • A Court Of Mist And Fury (Court of Thorns and Roses #2) - Maas, Sarah J.
  • A Court Of Silver Flames (Court of Thorns and Roses #4) - Maas, Sarah J.
  • What Girls Are Made Of - Arnold, Elana K.
  • A Court Of Wings And Ruin (Court of Thorns and Roses #3) - Maas, Sarah J.
  • Milk and Honey - Kaur, Rupi
  • Forever - Blume, Judy
  • Tilt - Hopkins, Ellen
  • Fallout (Crank, Book 3) - Hopkins, Ellen
  • Oryx and Crake - Atwood, Margaret
  • Blankets - Thompson, Craig
  • Empire of Storms (Throne of Glass #5) - Maas, Sarah J.
  • Living Dead Girl - Scott, Elizabeth
  • Damsel - Arnold, Elana K.

The official list is here.

It’s only 15 books long because apparently this law only recently came into effect. The first batch of 13 were all banned on the same day last August.

I see two clear trends in what’s been banned so far:

  1. Horny fairy books (Sarah Maas)
  2. Gritty coming-of-age books (Elana Arnold, Judy Blume, Ellen Hopkins)

The Rupi Kaur ban surprises me. I didn’t think enough people read poetry for anyone to bother banning it.

Of course, the most consistent them across all the books, is sex.

How Does a Book Get On the List?

  1. Meet the definition of “Objective Sensitive Materials” (as determined by the state school board I guess?), and
  2. Either three school districts vote to remove from their libraries, or two school districts plus five charter schools vote to remove from their libraries.

The definition of “Objective Sensitive Materials” is tough to piece together because they’ve scattered the definition across at least three different sections of the Utah Code. The original bill says this:

“Objective sensitive material” means an instructional material that constitutes pornographic or indecent material, as that term is defined in Section 76-10-1235, under the non-discretionary standards described in Subsection 76-10-1227(1)(a)(i), (ii), or (iii).

OK. So Utah Code 76-10-1235 is titled “Accessing pornographic or indecent material on school property.” It says:

(1)	As used in this section:
  (a)	"Pornographic or indecent material" means any material:
   (i)	defined as harmful to minors in Section 76-10-1201;
   (ii)	described as pornographic in Section 76-10-1203; or
   (iii)	described in Section 76-10-1227.

So you go down the next layer of indirection to Section 76-10-1227, which is titled “Indecent public displays – Definitions.” And the relevant section in there says this:

  76-10-1227.  Indecent public displays -- Definitions.
  (1)	For purposes of this section and Section 76-10-1228:
    (a)	"Description or depiction of illicit sex or sexual immorality" means:
    (i)	human genitals in a state of sexual stimulation or arousal;
    (ii)	acts of human masturbation, sexual intercourse, or sodomy;
    (iii)	fondling or other erotic touching of human genitals or pubic region; or
    (iv)	fondling or other erotic touching of the human buttock or female breast.

But! Note that the original bill didn’t include all four of those items. It includes (i) (aroused genitals), (ii) (sex acts), (iii) fondling genitals, but NOT (iv), fondling boobs and butts.

So all of you that are writing boob- and butt-fondling porn are safe.

Note also that the definition specifies “human” genitals, masturbation, etc., so werewolf shifter Omegaverse porn probably also gets a pass as long as they only have animal dicks.

Now let’s unpack all this a little bit.

There’s a ratchet effect at play here. Start with a definition that was originally created for “indecent public displays”. Then incorporate that by reference into a definition of “pornographic or indecent material”. Then incorporate that by reference into a definition of “Objective Sensitive Materials”. Though I have a lot of sympathy for the difficulty of the job being done by legislative staff (I interned at the Utah State Legislature way back in the day), I’m still gonna say this is shitty legislative drafting.

The ratchet effect continues in the process for getting a book on the banned list. If three different school districts ban a book, and the state school board agrees that it contains aroused genitals, masturbation/intercourse, or genital fondling (but not boob fondling!), then the book is banned. That means that boards in the three most conservative districts of the state get to ban things in the least conservative part of the state. And you can see that happening in the bans so far, which are overwhelmingly coming from the Alpine, Davis, and Washington school districts.

utah book bans by district

The statewide part is particularly grating. If this were just about individual parents trying to set rules for their own kids without the school undermining them, I could understand it better. But you don’t need a statewide ban for that. A school-level or district-level ban would do. So it’s not just about parents protecting their own kids. It’s about the most conservative telling other parents how to protect theirs.

Now here’s the biggest click of the ratchet: Not only do these bans apply to books purchased by schools and placed in their libraries, the state school board’s FAQ says “Titles identified as Objective Sensitive Material and meeting the threshold for statewide removal are prohibited on school property”, and, “These titles should not be brought to school or used for … personal reading while on school property.” So it is not just about stocking libraries. The girl quietly reading her own copy of ACOTAR during lunch break? Violation. The parent who reads one of these books while waiting for their parent/teacher conference appointment? Violation.

I could be wrong, but I doubt that’s what the legislators had in mind when they passed this law. Again, shitty drafting.

It’s also hard to miss how female slanted this all is. Fourteen of the fifteen banned books are written by women. I’m comfortable saying that the target audience of these books is overwhelmingly women as well. A few guesses as to why:

  • Women tend to be drawn more to books about romantic relationships. And romantic relationships quite often lead to sex.
  • There’s a stronger tradition of trying to “defend” female virtue. (Though I’d have to say Utah Mormon communities still dish out the sexual shame to boys pretty generously too).
  • Conventional wisdom says that women tend to prefer reading their smut more than men, who tend to prefer viewing it. (With many many Mac-truck-sized exceptions to those generalizations, for sure.) And despite the Utah law applying equally to “descriptions or depictions”, we do not treat text and images equally. No one gets upset that middle school librarians aren’t stocking Playboy on the shelves. (Though I’d say the pictures in Playboy are a lot less explicit than a lot of romantasy love scenes.)

It’s worth asking “How would I steelman this?” Is there a version of the law that would address the concerns of the more conservative parents but be more palatable to me? It would help if the law addressed distinctions that I think are pretty intuitive to most people. A school buying a book and putting it on the shelf is not the same as a student buying it and reading it. A student reading one of these books on school grounds is not the same as a grownup reading one of these books on school grounds. The list of things that are inappropriate to do in a public setting (as provided in Utah Code 76-10-1227), is not the same as the list of things that are so horrible that someone shouldn’t be allowed to read them in a book while on school property.

Or, an easier challenge. Can you craft a law that prohibits kids at school from passing around issues of Penthouse but doesn’t ban horny fairy books? It is possible. The law could distinguish between images and text. And I could imagine good reason to: If someone’s looking at pornographic images on their phone, magazine, or whatever, it’s pretty hard to avoid them also being seen by all the people around them. Text is different. You’re not going to have a graphic sex scene burned into your brain just from looking over someone’s shoulder for a half second while they’re reading ACOTAR.

If you live in Utah, you can find your legislators and their contact information here.