Iowa’s ‘book ban’ blocked for now. Now what?

Just before the new year, a federal judge in Iowa temporarily enjoined the implementation of parts of Senate File 496, which was signed into law by Gov. Kim Reynolds last May.

In part, SF 496 sought to prohibit instruction on gender identity and sexual orientation in Iowa schools up to and through the sixth grade. The law also prohibited literary material with “descriptions or visual depictions of a sex act,” using the law’s existing definition to define “sex act.”

The law was challenged in federal court by a large book publisher, several advocacy organizations and a handful of LGBTQ students in Iowa. The temporary injunction doesn’t repeal the law outright, but it does mean that while the challenge continues to be heard in court, the state can’t ban curriculum about gender identity and sexual orientation to kids 6th grade and younger or ban schools from including books at any grade level that contain depictions of sex acts.

Yes, I used the word “ban.” It fits the dictionary description. When books are yanked from the shelves due to their content by force of law, that is at best a de facto ban. And as I wrote after the conclusion of the 2023 legislative session, I’m not a fan of book-banning. So when I learned last that the judge put a temporary halt on enforcement of the law just days before it was to take effect, I wasn’t angry.

But I wasn’t glad, either. Enjoining the law may stop the state from banning certain books, but it’s not the role of an injunction to substitute a solution to the original problem an enjoined law sought to address. This law was passed in the first place out of concern that many Iowa students are being provided with curriculum and literary content that could be as damaging as it is educational, if not more.

Opponents of SF 496 insist was designed and executed as nothing other than an attack on LGBTQ students. Proponents disagree, saying the curriculum prohibition was about inappropriate themes of sex and sexuality altogether for children too young to understand, as well as the teaching of opinions incompatible with fact. The prohibited sexual content defined in Iowa code contained no distinctions made in terms of gender or sexual orientation, so all sexual content, regardless of orientation, was axed, with no distinctions between LGBTQ and heterosexual content.

Ironically, that absence of distinction is what made the law so broad — too broad to enforce, said Judge Stephen Locher, who wrote that the law has “resulted in the removal of hundreds of books from school libraries including, among others, non-fiction history books, classic works of fiction, Pulitzer Prize winning contemporary novels, books that regularly appear on Advanced Placement exams, and even books designed to help students avoid being victimized by sexual assault.”

That’s not good, but it’s what happens when we try to cure the evils of the world by legislation. Pass legislation that is weak and risk falling short of the intended solution. Pass strong legislation, and risk overreach that violates someone’s rights — and, in this case, gives them standing to sue for relief. Not only is a new problem then created — the original one is not solved.

I get why the attempt was made through legislation. Human beings, whether as individuals or as groups, will always seek to accomplish their goals using the least arduous means possible. With such huge Republican majorities in the right places, advocates of removing objectionable content from school libraries undoubtedly saw legislative action as method with a highest and quickest chance of success. Especially considering how some school districts did not share some parents’ concerns about books with some pretty serious subject matter: a committee assembled by the Urbandale School District, for example, reviewed and ultimately chose to retain several books in 2021 after a parent challenged them, citing pornographic and racially offensive material inappropriate for high schoolers.

One of the books, a memoir called “All Boys Aren’t Blue,” explicitly depicts a young teenager being sexually exploited by their cousin. The assault is a defining experience in the author’s life — one shared in earnest. But it’s also extremely mature content that gives even some proponents pause. In an editorial for the Palm Coast Observer in Florida, another state grappling with the removal of certain books, editor-turned publisher Brian McMillian heaped praise on the book, describing its author’s intent as “educational,” but disagreed with the author's claim that it was suitable for kids as young as 14.

“ … (I)f I had a vote,” wrote McMillian, “’All Boys Aren’t Blue’ would be available only with parental consent — or perhaps only to ages 17 and up — just like a Rated-R movie in our society.”

That’s the general principle, here: Some of the content in books that have parents freaking out is not suitable for all ages — even in high school. The non-fiction work “This Book Is Gay” bills itself as an instruction manual for young LGBTQ people to navigate life using insights about sex and relationships, including instructions on how to use “sex apps” given in the second person: “If you’re THAT HORNY that you want to do a ‘sex meet,’ the author writes, “meet the ‘trick’ in a public place for a drink first. That way you can assess if you fancy them in the flesh/they are not a twitchy-eyed freakazoid before letting them into your house.”

(No, the book really says that.)

To an 18-year-old high school senior already legally able to use dating apps and watch pornography, such a book might contain some useful insights that they’re old enough to consider, albeit without much warning about the risks to physical and emotional health associated with casual sex and many partners. But putting the same book in the hands of a barely-14-year-old freshman — especially a late-blooming, vulnerable one — and it could have a negative influence on that kid that no one, including the author, intends.

Those concerns aren’t going to disappear just because Iowa’s de facto book ban is temporarily — and eventually, I predict, permanently — blocked. Perhaps we wouldn’t even have found ourselves at this point if some school officials had been more upfront and proactive in addressing parent concerns.

And perhaps now is a good time to revisit those concerns and see how they can be reasonably dealt with. Could more narrowly-tailored policies be written to address appropriateness in content? Could opposing sides reach a compromise on what constitutes unsuitable content? Could school districts work with the providers of their online systems to allow parents to be notified about what their kids are checking out from the library and refuse their child access to certain titles without having them restricted for other students or removed altogether?

Banning books doesn’t make for a hill I want to die on. Neither does the defense of books with content that could have a harmful influence on a vulnerable, naive kid or curriculum that bends facts to ideals. But political majorities like to act through legislation when people don’t see it their way quickly enough. It’s almost second nature for those in power to ban what they deem objectionable or dangerous. Some Republicans would ban any and all abortions in the name of saving innocent lives. Some Democrats would ban any and all guns for the same.

Yes, it’s a bipartisan game, one Democrats play just as well. Object to conversion therapy? Ban it wherever you have jurisdiction. Cast a wide net of definition. Even if it chills forms of legitimate therapy.

Object to speakers on college campuses who say things that hurt your feelings? Call for their ban under the assertion that their commentary is “harmful” to certain people and groups. To heck with that same 1st Amendment that proved helpful to the aforementioned lawsuit.

Object to fossil fuels? Ban them by banning products that use them. Ban the sale of new gas-powered cars by a certain year like a handful of states have already promised. Turn the American vehicle market into its own version of Cuba and opt instead for higher-priced, less reliable cars that some just won’t be able to afford. And hey — ban the installation of gas-powered stoves and gas-powered furnaces lilke New York while you’re at it. Forget transportation — who needs affordable energy?

Each side utilizes bans in their own way. They’re almost always bad ideas done with earnest intentions. This one is likely not going to work — but that doesn’t mean there’s no more work to do.

Comments: 319-398-8266; althea.cole@thegazette.com