Bibles Banned From Utah Schools After Parent Demanded Its Removal
June 2, 2023A Utah school district banned the Bible from its elementary and middle school libraries for containing “vulgarity or violence” after a parent used the state’s bans on pornographic and indecent content against Christianity's horniest fanfic.
In 2022, Utah passed a law banning books with “pornographic or indecent” content, and defined those terms loosely and vaguely, which restricted access to many titles that contain age-appropriate themes addressing characters’ gender, sexuality, and race. Young adult fiction authors including Judy Blume, Maia Kobabe, Jodi Picoult, and Sarah J. Maas were among those restricted from school libraries in the Alpine School District in Utah, the state’s largest district.
In March, a parent in Utah wrote to the Davis School District, demanding that the Bible should be taken off shelves based on the new law. “Incest, onanism, bestiality, prostitution, genital mutilation, fellatio, dildos, rape, and even infanticide,” they wrote, accurately and non-exhaustively. “Get this PORN out of our schools… If the books that have been banned so far are any indication for way lesser offenses, [the Bible] should be a slam dunk.”
The district appointed a committee to review that parent’s complaint, and determined that while the Bible can stay on high school shelves, it needed to be removed from younger grades. Davis School District spokesperson Christopher Williams told the Salt Lake Tribune that Bibles would be removed from seven or eight school libraries in the district effectively immediately.
According to the Tribune, another parent has already appealed that parent’s demand, so the district will need to form a committee consisting of three members of Davis School District’s Board of Education, which will make a recommendation and send the decision to the board for a vote.
But for now, Bibles—with their descriptions of rape, incest, bestiality, and violent baby-killing—will be kept away from children at those schools.