Attempt to Remove San Diego Library’s LGBTQ Books Backfires
Two San Diego residents checked out nearly every single book in their library’s Pride Month display, claiming that such materials shouldn’t be available to children.Across the nation, conservative groups have pushed to ban books that discuss LGBTQ issues from libraries and schools, often arguing that they are pornographic or obscene merely because they depict LGBTQ identity.This attempt to stoke culture-war flames in San Diego backfired, according to The New York Times, ending with an outpouring of community support for the library in the form of increased monetary and book donations.
As soon as The San Diego Union-Tribune reported on the protest, new copies of the checked-out books began to arrive at the library.
About 180 people, mostly from San Diego, donated $15,000 to the city’s public library system. The funds, which the city will match, will go toward LGBTQ materials and programming, including drag queen story hours.Furthermore, the books were recently returned after the patrons who checked them out realized their scheme had backfired — this is not the future that conservatives wanted.Adrianne Peterson, manager of the Rancho Peñasquitos branch of the San Diego Public Library, was worried when the two residents emailed her last month to say they would not return the books unless the library removed this “inappropriate content.”“It was just kind of like, ‘Whoa, curveball,’” Peterson, who has run the library branch for more than a decade and highlighted books for Pride Month for half of that, told the Times.
