Advocate.com [Unofficial]California city that banned the Pride flag poised to get powerful gay congressman
https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://www.advocate.com/politics/election/huntington-beach-robert-garcia
Techdirt [Unofficial]Knox County, TN Rolls Back ‘Roots’ Book Ban After Backlash
NewsletterTF'Gender Queer' Sees Expanded Edition Amidst Persistent Bans
A new annotated edition of 'Gender Queer' is out now, featuring extra content, as the book faces ongoing challenges in US schools and libraries.
#GenderQueer, #BookBans, #LGBTQBooks, #OniPress, #MaiaKobabe
https://newsletter.tf/gender-queer-annotated-edition-book-bans-us/
The newly released 'Gender Queer: The Annotated Edition' includes new commentary and contributions from various artists, offering deeper insights into the graphic memoir.
#GenderQueer, #BookBans, #LGBTQBooks, #OniPress, #MaiaKobabe
https://newsletter.tf/gender-queer-annotated-edition-book-bans-us/
azteclady"What happens when publishers begin avoiding LGBTQ+ stories before a book is ever challenged? This article explores how years of censorship efforts are creating a chilling effect across the publishing industry, making it harder for queer voices & stories to reach readers"--Freedom to Ready Project (in Bluesky)
#FreedomToRead #BookBans #Censorship #Bigotry #Writing @bookstodon
IndieAuthors.Social NewsFighting Oppression: 5 Graphic Novels About Book Banning
Up your knowledge and insights into censorship across time and place with these excellent graphic novels about book banning.
https://bookriot.com/graphic-novels-about-book-banning/
nat weaverIndie authors must be political
📚 Indie authors: people will complain about you and call you too political, and beg you to stick to writing fiction. But if we don’t speak up and push back, our stories will be banned from libraries, book stores, and online. It’s already happening.
Literally if I don’t get political there’s a real chance I won’t be able to write stories anymore because it’ll be illegal for me to do so.
So I say: write like hell and yell like hell. Because our stories deserve to be read.
#CallToAction: call your Congresscritters NOW. Tell them to vote no on all three book banning, transphobic, shitty bills.
Graphic by Authors Against Book Bans' Jerrold Connors
#USPolitics #BookBans #Transphobia #Bigotry #Censorship #Libraries #FreedomToRead #AuthorsAgainstBookBans
In the U.S., Texas Asks Court to Resurrect ‘Unconstitutional’ Book Rating Law, Alarming Publishers and Booksellers
After more than two years, the return of H.B. 900, which would require bookstores and vendors to review all books in Texas schools at their own expense and rate them for sexual content, is a tense, and unwelcome development for freedom-to-read advocates.
The post In the U.S., Texas Asks Court to Resurrect ‘Unconstitutional’ Book Rating Law, Alarming Publishers and Booksellers appeared first on Publishing Perspectives.
https://publishingperspectives.com/2026/05/in-the-u-s-texas-asks-court-to-resurrect-unconstitutional-book-rating-law-alarming-publishers-and-booksellers/
MikeDunnAuthorToday in Labor History May 25, 1925: The state of Tennessee indicted high school science teacher John Scopes for teaching his students the truth (i.e., evolution). He eventually lost his trial, was fined $100, and then won an appeal. However, the law he broke, the Butler Act, was ruled constitutional by the state supreme court and remained in effect until 1967. Scopes was defended by Clarence Darrow, the same lawyer who defended countless labor organizers and leftists. Darrow defended IWW cofounder Eugene Debs on trial for his role in the 1894 Pullman strike. He got IWW cofounder Big Bill Haywood acquitted in his trumped-up trial for the murder of former Idaho governor Frank Steunenberg in 1906. He defended the McNamara brothers (IWW members and labor activists) in their trial for bombing of the Los Angeles Times building in 1910. The prosecuting attorney was William Jennings Bryan, who previously had run for president three times, served in the House, and served as Secretary of State under Woodrow Wilson. Bryan was considered a nominally left-of-center Democrat. He was anti-imperialist and a supporter of women’s suffrage and equal pay. He was also pro-labor, earning the endorsement of the American Federation of Labor in his presidential bids. He supported an eight-hour work day, as well as a guaranteed living wage. But he was also a big supporter of prohibition and opponent of Darwinism.
For years now, 20 U.S. states have followed the Next Generation Science Standards for their first-year biology courses, and nearly every state offers the College Board’s AP Biology curriculum, in which Evolution and History of Earth are considered central and unifying principals of biology. At the same time, however, teachers are being threatened with termination and legal action in some states for simply uttering the word “gay” or “homosexuality,” or for neglecting to report students they suspect of being nonbinary. And if the recently passed “Don’t Say Trans” bill makes it through the Senate, we could see teachers fired for using students’ preferred pronouns and for not denouncing trans and nonbinary kids to their parents. Meanwhile, trans and nonbinary students are already being denied access to the restroom of their choice. For decades, teachers have been mandated reporters of suspected child abuse and sexual abuse. Now, many of us are in the contradictory position of being required to report LGBTQ kids, with the consequence that these children will be subjected to abuse by the state and possibly by family members, too. Teachers also are being punished for teaching the truth about Palestine, the American Civil War, slavery, the Civil Rights movement, U.S. imperialism. Books are being banned from school libraries. Palestinian, Arab and Muslim students are being harassed and intimidated on campuses; their free speech suppressed by administrators who’ve been beaten into submission by well-organized Zionist parents.
And starting in the 2025-2026 school year, a SCOTUS ruling gave parents of kids attending public K-12 schools the right to have their kids excused from any and all curriculum that goes against their “beliefs” AND mandates that teachers provide alternative curriculum and assessments for these students. I used quotes on “beliefs” because parents can claim anything goes against their beliefs, regardless of whether it is a religious or spiritual belief of theirs, or one that their religious leaders have ever mentioned. It not only allows students to get out of evolution lessons, in spite of the Next Generation Science Standards, but it also means they can be excused from lessons on slavery, the Civil War, the labor movement, the Civil Rights movement; from any literature they don’t like; from physical education activities they feel aren’t American, or manly, enough; from algebra, since it “comes from an Arab” (when in reality, it’s because their child does poorly in math and they want a higher grade point average to get an edge for college).
#workingclass #LaborHistory #lgbtq #evolution #education #schools #teachers #children #homophobia #ProtectTransKids #TransRightsAreHumanRights #palestine #freepalestine #zionism #racism #censorship #freespeech #bookbans
