About the Books

Last December, I testified before the Assembly Committee on Education, alongside Mr. Zenobia, in support of Representative Allen and his co-author's bill AB 308. The bill would repeal sections 944.21(8)(b)1 and 944.21(8)(b)2 of the WI statutes relating to the protection from prosecution for employees of libraries and educational institutions who provide obscene materials to minors.

Why does this exist? During the hearing, Legislative Counsel explained the history of this exemption. While it could be linked to the introduction of human growth and development being taught in public schools, it has evolved to defend practices that erode any semblance of age-appropriateness in our public schools and libraries.

As stated in my testimony,

"Let me be clear. No one should be exempt from the consequences of letting children have access to obscene material. NO ONE."..."Choosing to shield our children from sexually explicit materials isn't banning or censorship. It's setting conscious, responsible boundaries, which is what adults do for children. It's literally being the adults in the room - protecting the innocence and wellbeing of the children in our care."

I will continue to advocate for the separation of materials with obscene, sexual content away from the educational plan of our school district. I believe that our district has taken a fair and balanced approach to this topic. There are materials that simply do not belong in children's hands, while there are others that parents need to be given the proper resources to make informed decisions about. The combination of library title management and parental notification aims to allow parental oversight while limiting the potential for unexpected or unauthorized exposure to explicit content. A child should never be required to read obscene or sexually graphic content for educational purposes. Furthermore, I believe our district has an obligation to provide students and parents with enough information to determine what choice books may be explicit in nature or contain adult themes, before having to stumble on such content unaware.

Regardless of the approach, it is ultimately the adults' responsibility to protect our children and to ensure that they are not exposed to inappropriate, graphic, or obscene content. It's unbelievable that any adult would advocate for a book like "Jack of Hearts" or "Lucky" to be available in our school libraries. These books depict graphic sexual acts, some of them violent, toward and between children. These two books were removed from the School District of Waukesha library catalog in 2023, and I fully support that decision. Advocates of these books refuse to acknowledge their harmful and traumatic content and continue to support an agenda of sexualizing children.

I offered the following inquiry and observation to the Assembly Committee:

'I'm curious. If you think the problem of obscene materials being accessible to children doesn't exist, then you shouldn't have any issue supporting the repeal of this redundant carveout. On the contrary, if you believe that there really are obscene or sexually explicit materials in these institutions, freely accessible to children, but you're afraid that a naïve school official is going to pay an unfair price when the blind eye is no longer turned, then you understand the problem perfectly. These materials should not end up in children's hands by accident. "

Who are we protecting with this carveout in the application of state law? It appears we are more concerned about protecting the adults and the institutions than actually protecting the children, and that is unacceptable on every level.

A link to my full testimony is here: https://youtu.be/IVk4Wv7i2e8