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Calgary Herald
a day ago
- Politics
- Calgary Herald
Christian conservative group Action4Canada lobbied for review of books in Alberta schools
Article content The president of the Library Association of Alberta believes a Christian lobby group may have played a role in the province's targeting of 'sexually explicit' books found in school libraries. Article content Article content Laura Winton pointed to posts on the Action4Canada website, where the group pats itself on the back for its 'behind the scenes' lobbying of the Alberta government over books its members find objectionable. Article content Article content Winton said that Action4Canada is known to contact librarians across the province over books that the group finds offensive. Article content Article content Earlier this week, Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides said the government would be consulting the public in order to create some standards when it comes to explicit material in school libraries. Four books were used as examples of materials that the ministry found objectionable for children: Maia Kobabe's Gender Queer, Alison Bechdel's Fun Home, Craig Thompson's Blankets, and Flamer by Mike Curato. The books deal with 2SLGBTQIA+ themes, and have sexual imagery and language. Article content Tanya Gaw, Action4Canada's founder, said members of her team met with Nicolaides in the fall of 2024. This was confirmed by the education ministry, but both parties differ on the effectiveness of the meeting. Article content Gaw said Action4Canada sent binders to Nicolaides and Premier Danielle Smith which outlined the harms caused by the books in question, and also warned against the adoption of SOGI 123 by Alberta schools, Article content Article content SOGI 123 is a Canada-wide organization that makes programming and resources available to schools in the areas of inclusivity and positive acceptance of gender identities. Article content Article content 'We wanted to show the harm and risks that children are being put into,' said Gaw. 'When he (Nicolaides) saw the binder, he was genuinely shocked. We have the right to be concerned about what our children are being exposed to. We opened the minister's eyes to this.' Article content Nicolaides said his decision was influenced by what he'd been hearing from parents around the province. Article content 'No, we had been hearing from parents,' he said. 'I've been hearing from parents for quite some time, in fact, since I became minister, about items in school libraries that were of concern.' Article content When asked if Action4Canada's lobbying efforts had any impact at all, Nicolaides had this to say: 'I'm unsure. I mean, they had brought some materials to our attention so that that helped to get a better understanding of the nature of materials that was available in schools. But, you know, this is a topic that I've talked with many Albertans about.'
Hamilton Spectator
a day ago
- Politics
- Hamilton Spectator
Conservative activists gave Alberta government list of ‘inappropriate' books in school libraries
Social conservative activist groups provided Alberta government officials with lists of books now facing prohibition under new provincial content guidelines for school libraries, the IJF has learned. On May 26, Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides announced the province is bringing in new rules for school libraries after investigations by his office found materials containing depictions of sexual acts, nudity, drug and alcohol use, profanity and other mature content on the shelves in Alberta K-12 schools. Alberta currently has voluntary guidelines for library books, but school boards follow their own processes for selecting age-appropriate and relevant materials for students. Because of the inconsistent standards between school divisions, 'sexually explicit material has made their way onto school library shelves,' Nicolaides said, and so public, separate, francophone, charter and independent schools will be required to follow province-wide guidelines starting in the 2025-26 school year. While the province said it identified multiple books with sexually explicit and inappropriate content, it has so far only named four coming-of-age graphic novels: Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe, Fun Home by Alison Bechdel, Blankets by Craig Thompson and Flamer by Mike Curato. Three of the four books focus on 2SLGBTQ+ characters and themes. Nicolaides told reporters in Calgary on Monday he was alerted to the issue by a group of parents who provided him with excerpts from 'many of these books and other materials' and showed him information suggesting they were available in different schools. However, members of the groups Parents for Choice in Education (PCE) and Action4Canada have since taken credit for supplying Nicolaides with the names of books they wanted removed from school libraries. In an email sent to followers, PCE celebrated the launch of Alberta's public consultation on 'sexually explicit' books in K-9 schools, telling members 'your efforts helped make this happen. 'PCE has worked with concerned parents for the past two years to expose this issue. Using a list prepared by Action4Canada, one of our dedicated volunteers submitted examples of graphic books to government officials—proof that titles like Gender Queer and Fun Home are available to children in Alberta schools. This consultation is a direct result of that work,' the email newsletter reads. PCE is an Alberta-based parental rights group that has previously taken issue with sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) education in schools , gay-straight alliance laws and other 2SLGBTQ-related policies. Action4Canada is a conservative Christian group with more than 60 chapters across Canada. The group promotes deeply conspiratorial beliefs, claiming the Canadian government and education system have been ' infiltrated by radical LGBTQ activists ' and that SOGI education and sexually explicit books are part of a ' global agenda to sexualize children, interfere with parental rights, eliminate the natural family and normalize pedophilia.' After Alberta announced its new library guidelines on Monday, Action4Canada posted on its website , thanking Nicolaides for meeting with their team and responding to their concerns about sexually explicit materials in Alberta schools. In the post, the group said its Calgary chapter has been communicating with government officials over several months, providing evidence of inappropriate books in schools and a 'comprehensive binder' that outlines supposed harms of SOGI education. Nicolaides told the IJF in an email he met with PCE and 'other concerned parents.' He did not respond to questions about whether he met separately with Action4Canada or when these meetings took place. Action4Canada has led campaigns to have sexual education and 2SLGBTQ+ themed books removed from public and school libraries in several provinces. A 36-page list of 'sexually explicit and pornographic books' available in Canadian libraries published by the group includes the novels Gender Queer and Fun Home. The list includes excerpts of text and images from the novels. Many of the same excerpts are found in a document the government of Alberta provided to reporters on Monday showing examples of sexually explicit and graphic content found in library materials. Corinne Mason, professor of women's and gender studies at Mount Royal University, said Nicolaides' initial claim that complaints about school library books had come from parents concerned about books their kids had access to in schools is a 'total misrepresentation of the facts.' 'It's a blatant lie from the minister about what's happened,' they said. Both Action4Canada and PCE are highly organized and well-funded lobby organizations, Mason said. And in the case of PCE, one with strong ties to the UCP government and Alberta's conservative movement. PCE executive director John Hilton-O'Brien was a founding board member and past president of the Wildrose Party of Alberta . During the 2022 UCP leadership race, Danielle Smith and other candidates participated in a forum on education hosted by PCE. Mason said that Action4Canada's campaigns have targeted 2SLGBTQ+ communities as ideological indoctrinators and dangerous to children in a time when the community is being violently harassed by hateful actors as pedophiles and groomers. And that it's problematic if the UCP government has been looking to them for frameworks around what is and isn't appropriate in schools. 'The fact that Parents for Choice in Education and Action4Canada, both of those organizations claim this as a win, I think that should be really, really concerning for folks like myself, who are very concerned about the influence of the parental rights movement generally in Alberta,' Mason said Nicolaides said in an email the actions being taken by the UCP government have nothing to do with the LGBTQ+ community. 'The fact that our actions of protecting young students from seeing porn, child molestation, self-harm and other sexual material in school libraries are being labelled as anti-LGBTQ is frankly irresponsible,' he said. Alberta Teachers' Association President Jason Schilling also expressed concern that the government was willing to meet with special interest groups about library materials, but not educators. 'Parents for Choice in Education and Action4Canada are special interest groups who frequently target the 2SLGBTQIA+ community. Their claims that the provincial government is taking direction from them and not educators is questionable and alarming,' Schilling said. PCE told the IJF that its interest 'is in the reasonable rights of parents. Nobody who attacks those rights can expect to escape our criticism. Those claiming that we are discriminating against them are merely using the LGBTQ+ community to excuse their egregious actions.' Edmonton Public Schools, the Calgary Board of Education , and the Library Association of Alberta have all said the province hadn't contacted them about the issue of age-inappropriate books in libraries before Monday's announcement. All provinces provide general orientations about library content, but it remains the business of school boards to decide what books it uses, said James L. Turk, director of the Centre for Free Expression at Toronto Metropolitan University. Setting guidelines that block certain types of books from being in any school libraries is 'really unprecedented,' he said. 'What they're doing is censoring books,' Turk said. 'It's an absolute break from whatever any other province has done. It's following the lead of Florida and Texas and Utah and some American states that are moving in this direction.' The Florida Department of Education has removed over 700 books from K-12 school libraries. The agency maintains that no books have been banned in the state and the materials are 'sexually explicit' and don't belong in schools. The number of banned books in Florida spiked after a 2023 law was passed requiring school districts to have a policy for challenging materials that 'depicts or describes sexual conduct, is not suited to student needs and their ability to comprehend the material presented, or is inappropriate for the grade level and age group for which the material is used.' The four books named by Alberta's government have been frequently targeted by censors throughout North America. Gender Queer has the distinction of being the most banned book in the U.S. in 2021 and 2023 , and the graphic novel shared the title of the most banned book in U.S. schools in 2022 with Curato's Flamer. These novels have also received multiple literary awards and continue to be selected for library catalogues by educators because of their ability to grapple with difficult subjects young adults are coping with in their lives, Turk said. 'They do raise challenging issues, but young adults deal with challenging things in their lives, and nobody is forcing anyone to read any of these books when they're in school libraries,' he said. Turk said these books may have been found in K-9 schools in Alberta because for students in grade nine and up they are appropriate. He added that he would be surprised if they appeared in the library catalogues of elementary schools. Nicolaides told the IJF these materials were found in schools across the province, but said they are not naming the individual schools to ensure the safety and security of teachers, staff and students at these libraries. The only specific school that has been identified as part of the province's investigation is an Edmonton public school for students in grades 4-9. Garrett Koehler, press secretary to the minister of education, shared images on social media of Flamer and Gender Queer on the shelves of the school, commenting 'these problematic books were found in and around books like Goldilocks…' Gender Queer has been awarded the American Library Association's Alex Award, given to books written for adults that have special appeal to young adults, ages 12 to 18. The Government of Alberta's press release for its age-appropriate book guidelines policy states the recommended reading age for Flamer is 14 and up, or younger with adult guidance.
The Guardian
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Spent by Alison Bechdel review – the graphic novelist faces up to midlife
Alison Bechdel emerged in the 1980s with Dykes to Watch Out For, a groundbreaking weekly strip that featured a group of mostly lesbian friends. Since then, her acclaimed graphic novels have focused mainly on herself and her family. Fun Home in 2006 (exploring her closeted, funeral-director father's suicide and her coming out) was followed by Are You My Mother? (psychoanalysis and her relationship with her mother) and The Secret to Superhuman Strength (her compulsive exercising, from karate and crunches to snowshoeing). These three erudite, pensive and observant works spend most of their time looking back. Where the modern Bechdel is present, she is mostly sketching, editing and narrating her past, and contemplating how everyone from Jack Kerouac and Virginia Woolf to paediatrician Donald Winnicott can help her shed light on it. In Spent, by contrast, we meet an Alison Bechdel who lives largely in the present. She writes and draws in rural Vermont, campaigns for progressive causes and hangs out with her friends and her wife, Holly. Yet this book-Alison is not quite the real Bechdel. In Spent, Alison's father was a taxidermist, not a mortician; Bechdel's two brothers have been replaced by a Maga-loving sister. In our world, Fun Home has been made into a Tony-winning musical and is being (slowly) developed into a movie starring Jake Gyllenhaal. The equivalent in Spent is Death and Taxidermy, a graphic memoir whose very loose TV adaptation (dragons and cannibalism feature, alongside Aubrey Plaza and Benedict Cumberbatch) is on to its third season. The book-Alison has mixed feelings about its success, but the royalties help fund the pygmy goat sanctuary she runs with Holly, and give her the leeway to prevaricate as she plans a new work: $um, an accounting of money and her life, with a little help from Karl Marx. Progress is slow: headlines about Trump's first term blare from her device screens, the goats are grabbing every opportunity to breed, Holly is increasingly keen to film everything for her social feeds and Covid has the world in its grip. America is atomised, with 'a zillion streaming options with six people tuned into each of them', Alison says. 'No wonder the country's a mess.' Yet Spent is anything but a book about a writer's lonely lot. Alison's liberal community bustles with gossip and life. There are vets to befriend, new neighbours to meet, anticolonial Thanksgiving dinners to attend and speeches to give against book banning. Just down the road, her friends Ginger, Lois, Sparrow and Stuart share a house, this quartet – in another metafictional twist – having wandered over from the panels of Dykes to Watch Out For. Spent, then, feels less like a fictionalised autobiography and more a gathering of threads from Bechdel's life and work, a celebration of and a rumination on where she has landed in late middle age, and how some of her fictional creations might live alongside her. That doesn't mean first-time readers won't enjoy it. Bechdel's acutely observant line drawings – here enriched with warm colour by the real-life Holly – lend themselves wonderfully to the alternately comfortable, intimate and awkward interactions of her cast as they gather around tamari-roasted turnips and fennel flambé to shoot the breeze. There's always been a spark to Bechdel's work, despite its often serious themes, and writing about herself from a greater fictional distance seems to have given her more room to have fun. Dramas and mishaps unspool with a lightly comic charm that belies the darkness in the world outside, from Alison's optimistic side-hustle (she pitches a reality TV show based on ethical living) to Sparrow and Stuart's experiment as a throuple with old friend Naomi (a vegan purple dildo is delivered with a wink by a FedEx driver). Yet it's longtime fans who will get the most from Spent. There's a real joy to seeing characters return, their shapes a little baggier, their hair greyer, but their spirits the same. If you've treasured sharing Bechdel's days spent hunched over her diary as a pale and anxious child, or cycling up the Adirondacks as a fitness-mad thirtysomething, it's poignant to meet an Alison whose fierce self-analysis has mellowed a little. There's a pathos, too, in seeing once-young radicals engage with a younger generation, in the form of Sparrow and Stuart's daughter JR, who has returned to Vermont after the collapse of her polycule. Spent isn't perfect. At times Alison's world, with its 'Shmetflix' and 'Schmamazon' and 'sage and sawdust' gluten-free stuffing, seems broad pastiche. There are stretches where you feel like you're watching comfortably off semi-retirees cosplaying as agricultural workers. Yet while Spent may lack some of the raw power of Bechdel's earlier work, this wise and playful tale has deep roots. On a flight back from pitching half-interested streaming networks about her reality TV show Alison soars over the 'intriguingly wrinkled landscape of the south-west', asks for a pencil and starts drawing over a TV script, the 'rasp of graphite on paper … opening the flat page into another dimension'. It's a neat epiphany and a lovely summary of the craft of comics, and it feels thoroughly earned. By the end of Spent, Alison has learned that she can't do everything, but that perhaps doing something – and being in the moment with people you love – is enough. It's an almost cosy conclusion, undercut by what we know but the book-Alison does not: that Trump will return, not long after her account has finished. Will Alison keep her newfound joie de vivre? I hope we get to find out. Spent: A Comic Novel by Alison Bechdel is published by Jonathan Cape (£20). To support the Guardian, order your copy at Delivery charges may apply.
Calgary Herald
4 days ago
- Politics
- Calgary Herald
Librarian groups worry censorship in Alberta government policies coming on book selection
Monday's announcement by the Alberta government that they will enact policies around the age-appropriateness of books in schools has library groups concerned that censorship of certain books could be the outcome. Article content Article content James Turk, the director of the Centre for Free Expression at Toronto Metropolitan University, said the government might not ban titles outright, but it is possible their policies will force school libraries to not carry certain books. Article content Article content Education and Childcare Minister Demetrios Nicolaides said Monday in a press conference that he met with parents who shared passages from graphic novels they found concerning. Article content Article content Four books of concern were named by the province in a media release, including Gender Queer, by Maia Kobabe; Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel; Blankets, by Craig Thompson; and Flamer, by Mike Curato. Article content Nicolaides said the government can't ban books, but Turk said the policies could be restrictive enough to keep some books off the shelves. Article content 'One of the things that every censor always does is to say what they're doing is not about censorship,' he said. 'What he's doing is precisely about censorship. What he's doing is saying there are some school boards in Alberta that would allow books that we don't think are appropriate.' Article content Article content Turk said the majority of books being challenged in the last few years are on the topic of sexual identity, are LGBTQ+ positive or touch on sex education topics. Article content The Centre for Free Expression tracks challenges to books at Canadian libraries. In 2023, 197 book challenges were tracked, but Turk said the number is likely much higher. School libraries often have an informal process, he said, where a parent may come in and lodge a complaint to the principal and the decision to keep or get rid of the book is not recorded. Article content School boards and libraries already have robust guidelines for book selection, including what is appropriate for what age, Turk said, and are continuing to be developed. Article content This year, the Centre for Free Expression is turning its attention to school libraries and encouraging more reporting of book challenges. A working group on schools and intellectual freedom has been formed to provide resources to schools and school librarians.
Calgary Herald
5 days ago
- Politics
- Calgary Herald
Braid: UCP reacts as kids exposed to shocking sex images in school libraries
Books in a school library are seen in this file photo. How did stuff like this ever get into school libraries? THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Calgary Herald ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. SUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Calgary Herald ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. REGISTER / SIGN IN TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account. Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments. Enjoy additional articles per month. Get email updates from your favourite authors. THIS ARTICLE IS FREE TO READ REGISTER TO UNLOCK. Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments Enjoy additional articles per month Get email updates from your favourite authors Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides put the question Monday by releasing excerpts from four graphic novels. Graphic is the right word. There are images of oral sex and hints of pedophilia. Explicit is too mild a word for some of the text. Most people will be shocked that this material is in school libraries frequented by kids as young as five or six. Predictably, Nicolaides is already being accused of banning books. We're a long way from that point. The minister just aims to protect little kids from very explicit sexual images. Your weekday lunchtime roundup of curated links, news highlights, analysis and features. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. Please try again But still, it's a risky precedent that bears watching. A group of parents came to Nicolaides' officials with the excerpts. His staff later confirmed the novels are available in K-12 schools in Edmonton and Calgary. This is an emotional subject for some parents, especially in rural Alberta. Many are convinced the schools are intentionally corrupting their kids. One of the novels, Fun Home, prompted a culture war in the U.S. last year, leading to bans in at least six states. Nicolaides took the sensational step of sending the images in an embargoed news release. He sure got our attention on a Monday morning. You won't find the pictures in this publication. Those who complete an online opinion survey will have access. Nicolaides is also accused of being anti-gay and anti-trans. But he did not once mention LGBTQ or transgender, although those themes are in the novels (as well as straight sex). In short, he did not inflame feelings against any group. Nor did he advocate a ban on other material relating to gay and trans people. He stuck strictly to condemning graphic sex and self-harm. Nicolaides also noted that government didn't order removal of the books and in fact has no authority to do so. But he said he'll consult and then develop a policy for schools. This is a mild approach, at least compared to the official rage aimed at school authorities in the U.S. If anything, Nicolaides will face criticism from some in the UCP base who don't think he goes nearly far enough.
