Duval County Public Schools has removed all books off the shelves of their library and classrooms to "err on the side of caution" in complying with Florida's anti-indoctrination laws.
The said the removal was to review the books for content that state authorities might say falls under the new guidelines because they don't want to face prosecution for indoctrinating school children, a third degree felony.
The state guidelines are pretty clear about what is not allowed for school children:
- Pornography – defined in the Merriam Webster dictionary as "the depiction of erotic behavior (as in pictures or writing) intended to cause sexual excitement."
- Instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity in grades kindergarten through three.
- Discrimination in such a way that "an individual, by virtue of his or her race, color, sex, or national origin is inherently racist or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously."
So why pull all the books?
The reasoning goes that since the new state guidelines say that all books should be vetted by state-trained media professionals, and none of the books in the schools had been vetted, so they pulled them all.
However, there's already a state database with tons of vetted book titles. Most of them common in schools.
I suppose it's possible that the county did not have any of those books, and had filled the schools entirely with pornographic and critical race theory books, but my guess is that it's more likely a political stunt to make DeSantis look bad.
The Duval County Democrats have the following pinned to their Twitter account.
These politicians, teacher unions, and teachers pretend that DeSantis is a totalitarian fascist book burner, but let's not forget that it's only been a year since these same people canceled Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, a year and a half since they canceled Dr. Seuss, four years since they canceled Laura Ingalls Wilder, and countless others.
Let's not pretend that these people are the champions of free speech or even the champions of diversity, inclusion, or compassion.
Around the country, schools are replacing those wholesome books with child pornography.
And horrible lessons propagating the worst sorts of divisive racism:
