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This story was originally published by F Newsmagine and is unaltered.
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Bucks County Book Bans [1]
['Ellie Gerken']
Date: 2024-04-12 12:04:59+00:00
As of 2023, Pennsylvania has the third highest number of banned books in the country
By Comics, Featured, Featured Comics
Transcript
Title: Bucks County Book Bans
By: Lily Christou
Page One
Panel One: Floating text reads: “As of 2023, Pennsylvania has the third highest number
of banned books in the country. Central Bucks School Board is currently considering at
least 65 books for banning. Below, an arrow points to a spot on an outline of the state of
Pennsylvania, with a caption reading “Bucks County PA”, a second arrow points so a
smaller region within Bucks County, with a caption that says “Central Bucks School
Board”
Panel Two: A young girl with a pony tail and glasses smiles. An arrow points to the girl
with bubble letters that say “Clara”. Clara says “Hi”. The caption floating next to her
reads: “My sister is a 6 th grader at a Quaker school just outside of Central Bucks. I was
curious about her thoughts.”
Panel 3: The caption asks a question from the narrator : “So, have you been talking
about book bans at school?”. The young girl, Clara, leans her head on her hand and
gazes to tge side, frowning. She says “Yeah. None are banned at our school because
we’re private”
Panel 4: Clara continues: “But they’re banning books with gay and queer people in
them because they sort of want to erase their identities”. Inside of a speech bubble,
there is a scene of a child wearing a shirt with an equal sign on it, sitting at a school
desk, looking annoyed as a teacher takes their book away, while saying “No”.
Panel 5: A pie chart titled “Books Recently Banned in America” shows that 41% of
recently banned books contain LGBTQ+ characters/themes. A small caption below
states that the information is according to literacy advocacy group Pen America. A
speech bubble, still connecting back to Clara reads: “Its stupid.”
Panel 6: Caption says: “Do you know any of the books that are being banned in
Bucks?” A speech shows Clara’s reply: “Oh yeah”. Next to the bubble three books are
floating: ‘Heartstopper’ by Alice Oseman, ‘The Girl from the Sea’ by Molly Knox
Ostertag and ‘All Boys Aren’t Blue’ by George M. Johnson. In the bottom right corner of
the page, Clara crosses her arms in annoyance and says “They’re all really good. My
teachers are having us read a lot of them because other kids can’t.” She continues, “It’s
just weird. Like why are they banning good books?” The narrator replies in the caption
box below, “Well, why do you think so?”
Page Two
Panel One: Clara taps her chin as she ponders her response “I guess that if kids aren’t
exposed to it, they won’t… Become gay.” The caption box below her speech bubbles
asks “Do you think a book can turn you gay?”. Clara responds: “No probably not.”
Panel Two: Caption box at the top reads: “What book are you most sad about other
kids not getting a chance to read?” In speech bubbles connected to panel one, Clara
says: “Probably Heartstopper. There’s also a good one called Melissa we read in 5 th
grade. It’s about a girl who gets bullied because she used to be a boy.” ‘Melissa’ by
Alex Gino floats behind the text.
Panel Three: Caption box reads: “What was your class’s reaction to the book? Did they
like say?” Two kids sit at school desks reading books. The speech bubble above them
connects back to Clara in panel one, and also down to the two kids, and it reads: “Oh
yeah. It was everyone’s like favourite book we read together. We were talking about it
and they were like ‘It’s so good!’ ‘Yeah!’”.
Panel Four: Caption box reads: “Are there any books you think should be banned?”
Clara has her brows furrowed in thought, as she replies “Maybe like any really
inappropriate ones. At schools? Maybe…” Another caption box reads: “What would you
describe as inappropriate?” Clara responds “I have no idea.” A small caption in brackets
says “I think that’s part of the problem”
Panel Five: Caption box reads: What do you think kids your age can do in response to
book bans and to anti-LGBT discourse at school in general?” Clara looks straight
forward with a determined look as she replies “I think it’s best to talk about it. Try to
make it more visible that this is happening.” Another caption box reads “For sure.”
Panel Six: Caption box reads: “Do you have any final thoughts?” Books float around a
speech bubble connected to panel 5 that says in bubble letters: “Bring back banned
books!” A final caption concludes: “Thanks, Clara”.
[END]
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