Wake schools reject parent’s book challenge, allowing ‘Lawn Boy’ to remain in library
The Wake County school board has rejected a parent’s request to remove an LGBTQ-themed book with sexually explicit language from Cary High School’s library.
“Lawn Boy,” is a coming-of-age story about a 22-year-old named Mike Muñoz who is growing up in poverty. It has some sexual scenes, such as Muñoz recalling how as a 10-year-old he had oral sex with another boy at a youth group gathering at their church.
Chad Slotta, a parent at Cary High and Republican candidate for the U.S. House District 13 seat, petitioned for “Lawn Boy,” by Jonathan Evison, to be removed. His requested was unanimously rejected by a Cary High committee in December, with a district committee of administrators voting 6-1 in January to support the school’s decision.
A three-member panel appointed by the board to hear Slotta’s challenge voted 2-1 on Thursday to allow Cary High to continue to offer “Lawn Boy.” Board member Christine Kushner said the book promotes “American values” of self-sufficiency, persistence and hope.
“Those who are focused on some of the sexual excerpts are missing the main themes that I see in the book, which are a young 20-something-year-old-man who has found persistence, is striving for self-sufficiency, who has overcome trauma that is outlined in the book, and finds hope from poverty, having a single mother, changing father figures,” Kushner said. “I found those powerful values.”
Board chairwoman Lindsay Mahaffey also voted with Kushner to reject the challenge. She and Kushner focused on how the book isn’t required material but something that students can choose to check out of the library.
Book’s sexual content questioned
Board member Roxie Cash was the lone no vote on the panel. She cited the sex scenes and language for voting to remove the book.
Slotta said in a statement Thursday that the board should have backed away from offering “sexually explicit, obscene material to minors.” He had read excerpts of the book at a a January school board meeting to argue that the language wasn’t appropriate for minors.
“I wish the school board would move past this knee-jerk defensive posture and just acknowledge that schools shouldn’t offer sexually explicit content to minors,” Slotta said in the statement.
School board members said this was the first book challenge they could remember hearing in many years. But parents in Wake County and across the nation are challenging books, often with LGBTQ content, that they say are pornographic because of graphic language or images related to sex.
A group of parents and community activists filed nine criminal complaints in December with the Wake County Sheriff’s Office accusing the school system of distributing obscene and pornographic material.
But Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman says she won’t file charges because she doesn’t believe the complaints rise to the level of being a criminal matter.
Slotta was not among the parents who filed criminal complaints. But in addition to challenging “Lawn Boy,” Slotta also is appealing Cary High’s decision not to remove “Out of Darkness” by Ashley Perez.
“Out of Darkness” depicts the 1937 school gas explosion in New London, Texas, that killed roughly 300 students and teachers. It has been removed from some schools in other states due to questions about its profanity and sexually explicit content.
Themes in ‘Lawn Boy’
The News & Observer previously read and analyzed “Lawn Boy.” The main character, Mike Muñoz has an older brother with a severe developmental disability and a single mother. They live in a trailer on a Native American reserve. Mike’s best friend spews blatant racism, homophobia, misogyny and xenophobia throughout the book.
The novel is told in first person through Mike, a landscaper who spends the majority of the book worrying about his financial status.
“Seeing a kid become an entrepreneur during this is something that we can all strive to and see that mentality of him growing up in this poverty, losing his father,” said Mahaffey, the board chair.
Muñoz forms a friendship with the town’s male librarian, realizes he’s attracted to men, comes out to his family and becomes the librarian’s boyfriend. The book contains profanity and three sex scenes, both heterosexual and homosexual.
Kusnner, the board member, pointed to how the book is recommended for teenagers by librarians. Several school librarians and high school students have spoken at recent school board meetings about having a diverse selection of books in schools.
Kushner also said Cary High students won’t see or hear anything in the book that they couldn’t find on their phones, in books across the street from the school at Barnes & Noble or in locker rooms for school athletic teams.
But Cash, the board member, said the sex scenes and language take away from the book’s message.
“Kids in poverty being persistent is a good idea for the world to understand,” Cash said. “The values were there. I don’t agree necessarily with some of the excerpts inside were needed to support those values.”
Even though the book isn’t required, Slotta said Cary High is tacitly recommending it to students by including it in the library.
“We expect our school system to teach anatomy and biology with excellence to prepare our kids,” Slotta said in an interview Wednesday. “But when it comes to human sexuality, that’s a topic that remains the exclusive purview of mom and dad.”
This story was originally published March 10, 2022 at 10:47 AM.
