From Publishing Perspectives:
Late-day news from Austin today (January 17) is that the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled “HF 900” a violation of the First Amendment protection in the United States. This is the result of a major lawsuit led by the Association of American Publishers, American Booksellers Association, the Authors Guild, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, and bookstores Blue Willow in Houston and BookPeople in Austin.
A joint statement from the plaintiffs provided to Publishing Perspectives reads, “We are grateful for the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals’ decisive action in striking down this unconstitutional law.
“With this historic decision the court has moved decisively to ensure the constitutionally protected speech of authors, booksellers, publishers, and readers, and prevent the state government from unlawfully compelling speech on the part of private citizens.
“The court’s decision also shields Texas businesses from the imposition of impossibly onerous conditions, protects the basic constitutional rights of the plaintiffs, and lets Texas parents make decisions for their own children without government interference or control. This is a good day for bookstores, readers, and free expression.”
The plaintiffs also provide three key highlights, quoting from the ruling:
The “district court was correct that the government-speech doctrine does not apply. The ratings are the vendor’s speech, not the government’s.”
The court concluded that the “plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of [their compelled-speech] claim. . . ‘[T]he right of freedom of thought protected by the First Amendment against state action includes both the right to speak freely and the right to refrain from speaking at all. . . ’ But the law requires plaintiffs to ‘either speak as the state demands’ or suffer the consequences.”
The “Supreme Court has said that ‘[t]he loss of First Amendment freedoms, for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.’ Because [the law] threatens the plaintiffs’ right to be free from compelled speech, the plaintiffs have shown an irreparable injury. They have also shown that they will suffer irreparable economic injury.”
Link to the rest at Publishing Perspectives
As usual, only if the parents make the decisions that the government wants them to make.
If you, the parent, wants your third grader exposed to explicit sexual content (largely of the homosexual and “other” varieties, not heterosexual), the government school will take care of that for you. You don’t have to actually pay $15.00 or so for the book, or go to the trouble of checking it out from the LGBTQI+ section in the local library. (You will have to supplement with a bit of your own money, though, if you want the explicit heterosexual content, such as found in Hustler magazine, to be provided to your child.)
However, if you, the parent, do not want your third grader exposed to explicit sexual content, well… scrape up the few thousand dollars for a private school (that you have vetted thoroughly), or find the time (possibly with someone giving up a paying job) to home school them.
Bit of a difference in the cost of making decisions for your child, isn’t there?
Its generally regarded that producing sexually explicit content is protected under the first amendment and that forcing adults to age verify is an invasion of privacy.
Given the above it’s difficult to identify a way to protect your child without constant monitoring.
Having said that, pre internet I don’t think I had any access to sexually explicit content prior to 8th grade, other then a knowledge that certain magazines existed and where sold in bags with covers.
So, forcing someone to age verify to buy alcohol, or to buy a handgun, or to buy cigarettes, or to buy marijuana, or to obtain a license to drive, or to do any of a multitude of other things – is an invasion of privacy? Seems that these are all Constitutionally acceptable “invasions” on the right to privacy.
The supposed Constitutional right to produce “sexually explicit content” is similarly “violated” in that it cannot legally involve minors or animals, cannot be performed in most public spaces, and other restrictions on the right.
All that the (majority) of the “book banners” are looking for is the restriction of the right to produce – or consume – sexually explicit material to adults. (By the legal definition of “adult” – which, admittedly, is an arbitrary measure – but one already used and accepted in a myriad of situations.)
Exactly. You even have to age verify to buy video games if they’re rated M for Mature. I found that out by surprise years ago when I bought “Jade Empire” when it came out on PC, and the check-out girl at Best Buy carded me. I was so confused I actually asked her if the game came with adult beverages. Sadly it did not.
I’m also in the generation that caused the PG-13 rating to exist, because “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” really is scary to a small child. I say this to point out that in no other sphere of media is it considered a hardship to pay attention to the ages of the consumer. In no other sphere of media is it considered a hardship to restrict adult content to adults, and to take into account if the audience is 17 or 7. How is it that books are suddenly the one medium you can’t do that with?
I cannot give the benefit of the doubt to a librarian or “educator” who thinks kids should be exposed to graphic sexual content. I saw some librarians whining, on another site, that parents are accusing them of being groomers. And moaning about the LibsofTikTok woman because they think she is the cause of their problems. Not the groomers she exposes, but her for exposing them. They complain of library patrons doing audits of what’s in the children’s section, and say how stressful it is to deal with them. And I just shrug.
“Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about.” <– This is the demographic they've chosen to go to war with. All I have to say is that the librarians and "educators" should leave the kids alone, or their parents will give said educators "something to cry about."
Another option for parents is to ask for a meeting with the teacher to discuss their concerns over various categories of reading materials and see how the teacher reacts. There are certainly exceptions, but I think most teachers are not anxious to cause an uproar in their classrooms. The other thing the parents can do is attend School Board meetings on a regular basis and make connections with individual board members to determine how they feel about the types of books and lessons that concern for the parents.
Uhh, PG, that teacher conversation these days can land you on an FBI watch list.
(Only a slight exageration.)
https://nypost.com/2021/10/21/wh-aided-school-board-groups-letter-before-garland-sicced-fbi-on-parents/
It is generally accepted (for now) that the government can’t compel speech (despite all the attempts that go unchallenged) but they definitely can and do compel thought in the school system.
And wait a bit until you see what that kind of instruction does to the millions of “uninvited” kids subjected to that kind of schooling in NY and Chicago. The law of unintended consequences is going to backfire big time on the folks busing them north.
Welcome to the age of stupid.