INSIGHT ‘‘ LGBTQ + Book banning mirrors US playbook


I’m sure you’ve seen the news coverage around The Lowry Academy’s specious “safeguarding” measures that had the school’s management leveraging an AI-generated list of 200 titles of books to be banned. This came after management directed the school’s librarian to conduct an audit and remove “inappropriate” books, without any kind of clear definition.


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T’S troubling that the librarian’s qualified opinion was overridden by something an agreeable AI model put together in response to a reactionary input. Unsurprisingly, many of the 200 titles were “queer” books. A PEN America study from last year found that 25 per cent of the books banned in US public schools in 2024 included LGBTQ+, Transgender or genderqueer characters. The refrain that such books are “inappropriate” is straight out of the American conservative’s playbook and has been proven to be hugely overstated, according to the PEN study among numerous others.


AI lists


Historically, you’d see individual books getting banned rather than lists; The Catcher in the Rye, 1984, The Bluest Eye etc. The format is and of itself, a matter of concern. The Lowry Academy’s list of 200 books was the AI spawn of identikit lists from across US states. Lesliediana Jones, associate director for public services at Harvard Law School Library, has studied these lists extensively. She talks about the practice of “copycat challenging,” which via social media, allows one group to lift a list of bannable titles compiled by another group to wield against their area’s public schools and/or libraries. The objectionability is


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corroborated state-by-state, strengthening the ideological base that underlies the bans.


Author Maia Kobabe, who wrote the widely banned Gender Queer, wrote on their experience of copycat challenges for NPR. After a first print run that sold out within the first week and two awards from the American Library Association (one of which was the Alex Award, which recognises books for readers “aged 12 to 18”), it seemed safe to say that the book was well-received and had been subject to very little pushback for a work of its kind. However, a few years and print-runs later, Kobabe’s book became a lightning rod. “A video of a parent railing against Gender Queer in a school board meeting in Fairfax, Virginia went viral and sparked an immediate series of copy- cat challenges elsewhere… There were so many challenges in such quick succession before the end of the year that I literally could not keep track of them all.” Jones says that the escalation of book challenges in the US is partially down to the group’s ability to organise themselves online, whereas previously: “You didn’t have the mechanisms and the media methods you have now...”


Outrage


The Lowry Academy’s been roundly condemned (you know you’ve been brought low when The Daily Mail is


denouncing your archconservative offensive) and many have expressed their outrage on behalf of the school’s librarian who left their position due to the stress caused by the safeguarding investigation that followed the book banning. It’s encouraging to see that the British media and public are on the right side here in backing the librarian who’s been victimised by their employer.


Homophobia


Additionally, the banned list’s implicit homophobia (one of many bigotries evinced) has been called out for what it is. It should go without saying that the only reason someone shouldn’t be able to check out a copy of Heartstopper from their school or local library is because it’s already on loan to someone else. But this case also provides yet another example of boneheads outsourcing their thinking with no regard for the how the outcome effects real people.


The new AI “mechanisms” that are increasingly relied upon in professional settings, provide a laissez-faire way for those at the top to legitimise structures that marginalise queer individuals. Our qualified, conscientious, and compassionate librarians should lead the conversation on user needs. The Lowry Academy’s mistake has shown us just how wrong the inevitably AI-sourced alternative can go. IP


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It’s encouraging to see that the British media and public are on the right side here in backing the librarian who’s been victimised by their employer.


Eilish Purton, Chair of CILIP LGBTQ+ Network


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