Banned Together

BY STEVE NUZUM

I recently participated in a panel at the University of South Carolina law school after a showing of the film Banned Together. The first film produced by the streaming service Kanopy (available through many libraries), the film focuses mainly on a student group responding to book bans in Beaufort.  

Watching the film was a little surreal, because I know many of its subjects very well.  These are the students and adults-- including members of the Diversity Awareness Youth Literacy Organization (DAYLO), Families Against Book Bans (FABB) and the South Carolina ACLU-- I’ve worked with and watched testify at many State Board of Education meetings over the past few years. 

These people and organizations deserve a spotlight, and I know that many of them fill that spotlight only reluctantly, driven by a passion for justice and equitable treatment. 

The events of the film kick off in 2022, when two Beaufort residents challenged 97 books that they said were available in either school or classroom libraries in Beaufort. And it ends with Beaufort returning most of those books to the shelves, thanks in large part to the advocacy work from local organizations like DAYLO and FABB. 

The student activism on display is powerful-- no more so than when Superintendent Weaver is shown claiming that the students have been “misled” by adults into believing that books are being removed. (I was in the Board meeting when the Superintendent said that, and the quiet pushback from the majority in the room was palpable.) 

That claim, which seems especially odd given how connected the students are to the reality of the situation in their schools, reminds me of the claims by Alabama that inspired Dr. King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”. In their open letter regarding the demonstrations led by King and other Civil Rights leaders in Birmingham, the clergymen accused “outsiders” of leading demonstrations against segregated facilities and other forms of racial injustice. As with those 1960s demonstrations, the claim that “outside agitators” must be stirring up the community suggests that what the students had to say really struck a nerve. 

As a district administrator says in the film, the students showed up to local board meetings prepared, with tight, 3-minute remarks that built on facts and ended with rational conclusions. In contrast, he says, the few proponents of removing the 97 books tended to ramble.  And as the film documents, some of these proponents also broke board policy-- by identifying student speakers by name during remarks-- or even crossed the line into threats and harassment. One Beaufort educator was forced to take a leave of absence for a large part of the school year after, she said, one of the community members who challenged the 97 books doxed her online and made remarks about which she and district officials found significantly threatening.  The community member was ultimately placed on a no trespass order by the district. 

Unfortunately, while the film ends on an uplifting note, the story has continued. 

Superintendent Weaver was able to pass Regulation 43-170, creating a process for statewide book bans which was radically different from the one used in Beaufort to consider challenged books. 

Beaufort created committees of parents and educators to read each challenged book and evaluate it according to a detailed rubric (which you can view here,  a Freedom of Information Act request

In contrast, the South Carolina State Board of Education’s Instructional Materials Review Committee (IMRC), chaired by Christian Hanley, who has received support in past runs for office by Moms for Liberty, does not read the books it considers. Instead, after receiving stock reports from Department staff members, it discusses books briefly (if at all) in an online meeting, hears a few minutes of public feedback (both Beaufort residents who made the initial challenges have been the only regularly-appearing proponents of removing books), and then quickly votes (usually to remove the books). 

After going through about fifteen of these books as a part of its process (which has resulted in more books banned statewide in South Carolina than in any other state), the State Board seemed to get very tired of hearing complaints every month. 

Horry County Board member Ken Richardson said during one meeting, “I love Columbia, especially when it comes to Gamecock football, but I don’t love driving to Columbia to hear about book bans.” Richardson also said, “I don’t think somebody from Beaufort should make me drive here from Myrtle Beach every meeting to talk about more books. My question is, when does this thing stop?”

Ultimately, the Board sent all of the 97 challenged books which it had not already ruled on back to Beaufort County, where, according to the South Carolina ACLU, they are all now age-restricted. 

A chilling effect

When the South Carolina Association of School Librarians (SCASL) and several South Carolina students filed suit against Weaver and Greenville Schools over the implementation of 43-170, they pointed out that beyond the direct impacts on students and educators of the explicit bans, the regulation has also resulted in “a chilling effect in South Carolina schools, as librarians take a better-safe-than-sorry approach to

avoid punishment.”

Classrooms, unable to really understand where the line is-- 1984’s explicit sex scenes are okay for all students according to the Board, while Flamer’s non-descriptive allusions are prohibited for all students statewide-- are likely to do the same, and indeed teachers across the state have removed their classroom libraries and changed what they choose to teach and discuss with students, not based on academic criteria, but on the fear that they will be arbitrarily punished if an individual parent or Board member disagrees with their choice

What I think we should take from the film is that advocacy, especially local advocacy, works, but also that it has to continue.  

The students from DAYLO in Beaufort entered tense meetings where many adults were understandably anxious about speaking, and they effectively pushed back on what they saw as a wrong being done. When the issue moved to the state level, they traveled halfway across the state to speak during State Board meetings. And while they should have been applauded-- whether you agree with a young person’s position or not, a willingness to engage this directly in the democratic process is incredibly admirable-- they met resistance even from the most powerful officials in South Carolina education. 

They, along with FABB, the ACLU, Freedom to Read, The SCEA, the ProTruth South Carolina Coalition, and many other groups and individuals, persevered, and while the return of the books to Beaufort for consideration is unfortunate, it at least means that those books are not currently on the chopping block for the entire state.  

A reminder that slow and incremental progress, the result of the hard work of community members and advocates, can be frustrating, but without it the harm would likely be much worse.