A Manitoba school division has decided not to form a committee to review and potentially remove books containing themes of graphic sexuality, incest, and gender identity from the library of Vincent Massey High School in Brandon.
Last month, Brandon School Division (BSD) trustees received a request from a former school trustee and grandmother, Lorraine Hackenschmidt, to form a committee of parents and trustees to review books and ban any that were deemed inappropriate from a school’s library.
Hackenschmidt appeared at a May 8 board meeting stating she had concerns over the messaging in some of the books that deal with sexual and gender identity.
“We must protect our children from sexual grooming and pedophilia. The sexualization agenda is robbing children of their innocence,” Hackenschmidt said at the meeting. “I just ask that you would remove any books that cause our kids to question whether they are in the wrong body. They are certainly not in the wrong body.”
“In making such a statement, that it’s ‘not possible to be born in the wrong body,’ you are denying the reality of others. And to invalidate that experience and the challenges that accompany that experience adds to the pain that transgender individuals live with every day,” said Ross, who was wearing a rainbow-coloured scarf around her neck.
Hackenschmidt had previously requested the board set up “a committee of parents and trustees to examine the LGBTQ books in our school libraries and remove those with vulgar language, description of sexual acts, and those that are pornographic.”
Breeanna Sieklicki was the only trustee who voted in favour of the formation of the committee to review books.
“I looked at six books within our school division,” she said before the vote, reading aloud sections of a book containing graphic descriptions of incest between a father and his daughter.
“We’re talking about reviewing the content of books, that’s appropriate. How does reading about a sexual act or viewing a sexual act in a picture book in our school libraries make anyone safer,” she asked.