More books have been challenged in recent years than ever before. According to the American Library Association’s (ALA) Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF), challenges of unique titles surged 65% in 2023 as compared to the previous year, reaching the highest level ever documented by ALA. What’s more, the ALA found that nearly half of demands were made by parents, patrons, or political/religious groups.
The OIF observed that pressure groups focused on public libraries and school libraries, and that often dozens, sometimes hundreds, of titles were challenged by a single entity at a time. Almost half (47%) of the titles challenged represent the voices and lived experiences of LGBTQIA and BIPOC individuals. This includes Black history, stories with a protagonist of color, and stories that discuss topics like puberty and teen pregnancy (Haupt, A., 2022).
Research supports that book bans are bad for mental health, especially impacting:
The reality is that everyone loses when books are banned because it discourages reading, turning our attention toward social media, web surfing, and television, which negatively impacts the brain’s ability to sustain attention, reduces long-term memory formation and retrieval, and discourages analytical thinking (Firth J, et al, 2019).........