Scholastic reneges on pledge to separate inappropriate content after woke mob attacks 

Children’s book publisher Scholastic backtracked on a recent policy decision to separate age-inappropriate sexual and race-related materials at bookfairs after protests from LGBT and CRT-minded lobbyists.

The abandoned policy separated out 64 titles carried by Scholastic about race and mature sexual themes and made them optional for book fair hosts, reported the New York Times. It was an acknowledgement that some states and schools may not desire or be permitted to carry such books.

Protest from the far left was immediate. 

“We call on Scholastic’s leadership to remove this exclusionary feature and commit to taking meaningful action to protect Black and LGBTQ books,” wrote Color Of Change, a racial justice advocacy group to the publisher. 

The company offered an apology for offending the feelings of what critics consider powerful liberal forces, which traditionally dominate the publishing and education market. 

“This fall, we made changes in our U.S. elementary school fairs out of concern for our Book Fair hosts,” Scholastic said. “In doing this, we offered a collection of books to supplement the diverse collection of titles already available at the Scholastic Book Fair. We understand now that the separate nature of the collection has caused confusion and feelings of exclusion. 

“It is unsettling that the current divisive landscape in the U.S. is creating an environment that could deny any child access to books, or that teachers could be penalized for creating access to all stories for their students.” 

It’s unclear how providing a separate space for titles would deny any child access to books that parents would deem appropriate, or how teachers could be penalized, supporting critics who believe it’s feelings, not facts, driving Scholastic’s policy change.  

The policy to separate out such books was driven in part by new state laws in places such as Florida, which require parental consent in order for a child to have access to mature content, said the New York Times.  

But advocacy groups such as the National Black Justice Coalition, the Children’s Defense Fund, Color of Change and PEN America pushed back against the commonsense policy, reported the Philadelphia Inquirer.  

And the publisher’s apology wasn’t just confined to a general statement by Scholastic, but was also privately directed to writers and illustrators, whose books Scholastic helps sell. 

“We recognize and acknowledge the pain caused, and that we have broken the trust of some of our publishing community, customers, friends, trusted partners, and staff, and we also recognize that we will now need to regain that trust,” Scholastic said in a letter to authors and illustrators, according to the Inquirer. 

Despite misleading rhetoric calling book policies “book bans,” which actually only require parental consent for some material based on age, there has not been one documented case in the U.S. where a child has been denied a book that his or her parents wanted that child to read.