Books offer readers the opportunity to explore and better understand their interior lives and the world around them. Compiled words spun into stories can sometimes allow us to experience imagined worlds that mirror our own reality, offer a different view of social ills, and inspire the reader to think differently. As one modern fantasy heroine says: “One must always be careful of books... and what is inside them, for words have the power to change us” (Cassandra Clare, Clockwork Angel). Some authors write the words most are too afraid to say because they can expose truths, inspire different ideas, and challenge order. It is the fear of such words that drives the desire to control or ban them.
The term “book banning” is recent, but the act dates back centuries to 1637, when Thomas Morton’s New English Canaan was banned by the Puritan government due to its critique of Puritan customs. Now, post re-election of Donald J. Trump, the campaign trail rhetoric of ending “wokeness” in school systems could fuel an acceleration in censorship and book banning. Trump has been vocal about plans to shut down the Department of Education and push the control of what children learn in classrooms and what books they will have access to back to the states. The conservative argument is that banning books protects innocent, young minds from the corruptive liberal agenda. This is not just about shielding children from American realities that they don’t need to know about, however. This transgression is censorship and will result in blocking a generation of young people from any alternative ideas, stinting their thought processes and imaginations and stifling their curiosity.
Books that address concepts such as the LGBTQ+ community, race, gender, and sexuality are heavily targeted in the banning movement. PEN America, an organization that aims to protect free expression and speech in the United States, uncovered that in the 2023-2024 school year, 44% of banned books featured characters of color and 39% featured LGBTQ+ characters. The book most challenged in the United States is Maia Kobabe’s Gender Queer, which focuses on LGBTQ+ characters and candidly addresses sexuality. The fourth most challenged title in the U.S. is a popular book, later developed into a movie, that describes the life of a teenage boy and his hardships in dealing with mental health, trauma, friendship, love, and inclusivity. Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower is currently deemed to promote violence simply because the author addresses the realities of many human lives– sexuality, rape, drugs, profanity, and mental health—to make readers feel seen, understood, and less alone. The Perks of Being a Wallflower, along with many other banned books, is a coming-of-age novel that strives to teach younger generations to weather life’s difficulties and embrace themselves. Wiping these words from existence may or may not delay exposure to the hardships depicted in the books; but the opportunity to learn, grow, and prepare for the reality that is played out in these fictional scenarios. These books do not promote violence as some claim. Rather, they are critical learning tools that celebrate our common humanity, promote inclusivity, and provide evidence that life’s droughts do not prevent people from blossoming into who they were meant to be.
The second era of the Trump presidency has stoked fear about censorship and book banning due to statements about eliminating the Department of Education and pushing control back to the states, as well as Project 2025’s proposed expansion of information control efforts in schools. The First Amendment protects our right to publish and speak freely, and thus far has prevented any book from being banned at a national level. In a 1982 challenge, however, the Island Trees School District V. Pico Supreme Court case split the issue as to whether local school boards could ban books without violating the First Amendment. The overall ruling was that censorship of books at a federal level is unconstitutional, and many questioned why this topic was elevated to the Supreme Court. While there has never been censorship or banning at a national level, there has been an uptick at the state level, and Trump’s stated desire to shutter the Department of Education and give the states more control could accelerate this trend. As detailed in the PEN American report, during the 2023-2024 school year, book bans increased by over 200 percent over the previous school year with a record 10,046 book bans in public schools, including more than 4,500 bans in Florida and over 3,600 in Iowa. If educational rights and access to literature is given back to the states, then logically books will continue to be more tightly controlled in states that are more conservative.
While it may be unlikely that challenged books will be banned at the federal level, there is precedence at the Supreme Court for hearing such a case, and the protection of rights offered by the First Amendment seems more fragile in this current climate. The brewing book banning crisis is potentially devastating for the next generation of Americans—children who will not be given full access to literature in which they see themselves reflected, literature that helps them understand the world in which they live. The right to free speech and communication and access to education are representative of key American values. Kasey Meehan, director of PEN America’s Freedom to Read program, argues that the “defense of the core principles of public education and the freedom to read, learn, and think is as necessary now as ever.” In fact, given the current political climate in this country, access to books and materials that are fundamental tools in expanding young people’s ability to build understanding and compassion for themselves, each other, and our shared world are more important now than ever.
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