Our post yesterday about controversial books found in the Greenwich Public Library’s Young Adult section has created some buzz.
There is a waiting list to borrow Gender Queer from the Greenwich Library.
However, using the Connecticut Library’s “find it” system, another 22 copies of the book have been located throughout the state. So for folks living in Avon, Bloomfield, Canton, Cheshire, Columbia, Cragin, Cromwell, East Hartford, Enfield, Granby, New Britain, Plainville, Rocky Hill, Simsbury, South Windsor, West Harford, Weathersfield, and Windsor Locks, you can head to your local library to find a copy today.
From what we can tell, most of these libraries also place this book in the Young Adults or Teen section. Though the library in Columbia specifically placed the book in the adult section, which seems to be a far more appropriate section if you plan on having pornography in your library.
By the way, we received a lot of questions about whether these books are in the Greenwich Public School library too, but we don’t know the answer… at least not yet, but we are working on finding out for you.
Though we did log into GPS's online book system, Sora, through a link on the GPS website. The books Gender Queer and Flamer were not available in the online collection for students, however the controversial book about 4th graders' gay sex encounters, Lawn Boy, was digitally available for Greenwich Students in the Juvenile Fiction section. A Texas mother recently created a stir by reading passages from Lawn Boy during a BOE meeting.
Really makes you wonder how libraries choose books, how the “age appropriateness” is determined, and who is making the determinations, doesn’t it? And why is Greenwich making controversial books like Lawn Boy easily available to students online?
P.S. Did you hear about the school in PA that just adopted a policy to remove “sexualized content” from the school library? Jealous?