The Importance of Defending Books and Authors (and Fighting Book Bans)

Fighting book bans is exhausting.

We’ve been in this battle for well over two years now. And some days it feels like it’s too much, too loud, too everything. But every day I’m reminded of why this fight is so important. Why it’s necessary. Whether it’s a teacher’s heartbreaking questions of how they can have an inclusive curriculum while being openly attacked in their communities or a school backing out of a scheduled lecture because of one loud, racist parent—this fight is worth our time and our rage.

(Defending Diverse Voice: The Battle Against Book Bans.)

We’ve all read the coverage about book bans—the yelling and crying at school board meetings and the protests and counterprotests outside schools. But there’s another side to bans that we don’t hear about and that’s been quietly undermining the freedom to read for much longer than the last two years—the quiet battle of fighting soft bans. 

In many cases, a single individual is withholding a novel from an entire classroom or school, but they’re not yelling about it. They’re simply, pulling books off shelves or preventing them from ever being purchased, under the radar. This is censorship—the very quiet kind. The kind that doesn’t end up on school board agendas or in news articles. 

But this kind of shadow book banning is dangerous and as overt book bans have become more and more pervasive, we’ve also seen teachers and librarians self-censoring—refusing to teach or shelve books that they fear might be controversial. This practice harms students while actively helping censors and enemies of the freedom to read and it comes about because book banners want to instill fear in us.

While my books have been banned in a handful of states, I am not amongst the “super banned” (a student I met used this phrase and it’s perfect). Those of us who are not widely banned or who have not been challenged at all, are in positions of power. We can speak out against book challenges more freely than our fellow writers who have not only been banned but have been doxxed, and their lives and livelihoods threatened.

How do we speak out? By every means at our disposal. Yes, that means social media. And yes, that means talking about censorship at our book events. It also means working with other authors and teachers and librarians to speak out locally—to go to your town’s school board and library board meetings to talk about the harm that bans cause. If you’re not sure what to say, use your allotted 2 or 3 minutes of speaking time and read from a book that is being challenged in your community. 

We must also get out the vote in local elections—many school board positions are won by only a handful of votes due to poor voter turnout. Can you make sure you vote and get five of your friends to join you at the ballot box? Perhaps you can take it a step further and write an op-ed for your local paper—where you live now or where you grew up—about the dangers of book bans and censorship. And in places where your librarians and teachers are under pressure to ban books from a few loud voices, your support and encouragement of their efforts can mean so much.

Check out Samira Ahmed’s This Book Won’t Burn here:

Bookshop | Amazon

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When some friends heard that my books had been banned, one jokingly said, well isn’t that an honor? No. No it’s not. My books being removed from shelves means that readers who might need that book, will not have access to it. It means that somewhere there’s a kid who needs to see themselves as a hero on the page, or who needs to feel less alone and who will be denied a book that might have given them hope. It means that entire identities are being erased from shelves. And contrary to popular belief, having your book banned does not increase sales. Sure, it might for a handful of books that garner media attention. But with thousands of challenges out there, it’s simply not true that bans have resulted in skyrocketing sales for all the titles being censored.

The business of publishing can be exhausting all on its own and in the best of all possibly worlds, we’d simply be able to put our heads down, dedicate ourselves to craft and write the best story we possibly can. But that world doesn’t exist—yet. 

As writers, we need to find the courage to get loud about the bans—especially if you’re an author whose titles have not been challenged. We need your voices now more than ever. When it comes to book banning, there is no neutral. Fighting against book bans takes courage, but so does putting your heart onto the page, so does placing a book in a reader’s hands and saying, I wrote this for you. We love being writers and it’s in that love where we can find the courage to fight for writers and readers everywhere.

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Resources to learn more:

Pen AmericaWe Need Diverse BooksNational Coalition Against Censorship