Ban This! - How One School Fought Two Book Bans and Won (And How You Can Too)
Available October, 2025.
Pre-orders available now!
Enough is enough!!!
In the fall of 2020 at the height of the Covid-19 epidemic, the Central York School Board voted unanimously to ban over four hundred resources from district libraries and classrooms. It became the largest ban in the nation’s history.
Among the offensive books were: Not Quite Snow White, Pink Is for Boys, I Am Enough, Sesame Street videos featuring Elmo, an African adinkra coloring book, a PowerPoint by a Black alumnus on how to attract minorities to take more Honors and AP courses, the anti-racism works of Dr. Ibrahim X. Kendi and the literary legacy of James Baldwin.
Among the offensive books were: Not Quite Snow White, Pink Is for Boys, I Am Enough, Sesame Street videos featuring Elmo, an African adinkra coloring book, a PowerPoint by a Black alumnus on how to attract minorities to take more Honors and AP courses, the anti-racism works of Dr. Ibrahim X. Kendi and the literary legacy of James Baldwin.
The majority of the banned books were children’s picture books, including Dr. Seuss books written in Spanish.
The fact that all the banned materials were by or about people of color was just a coincidence, the then-school board president told the media.
I think not.
The ban was an attack on the Black, Brown, and LGBTQIA+ community by White Supremacists to subvert culture, whitewash stories, and rewrite, re-envision American history. By redefining what it meant to be a patriot, they sought to erase non-White faces from the tapestry.
A courageous team of two teachers and a group of high school students stood up to the school board and said, “Enough is enough!” The Panther Anti-Racist Union (PARU) held daily protests over eight weeks and spoke out against the Board’s aberrant decision. They successfully broke the racist blockade (not once but twice!) to ensure that students across the district could read the books of their choice.
Their book, BanThis: How One School Fought Two Book Bans and Won (And How You Can Too) is a blow-by-blow testament of arguments and counter-arguments that came up as PARU navigated the perilous waters of Christian Nationalism, White Supremacy, and the privilege of people who wanted to suppress student freedom to read, based on the false dog whistle of parental rights. The only rights these racists wanted was to decide for other parents how to raise their children.
As the rights of the American people are eroded and corrupted by the same government sworn to protect those rights, this is the time to stand with PARU and say, “Enough is enough!”
If you would like to know more about PARU and their outrageous battle for the freedom to read click here for articles and interviews about them. If you’d like to know more about teaching children the importance of intellectual freedom, check out the study to Ban This: https://lernerbooks.com/teaching_guides/964
I think not.
The ban was an attack on the Black, Brown, and LGBTQIA+ community by White Supremacists to subvert culture, whitewash stories, and rewrite, re-envision American history. By redefining what it meant to be a patriot, they sought to erase non-White faces from the tapestry.
A courageous team of two teachers and a group of high school students stood up to the school board and said, “Enough is enough!” The Panther Anti-Racist Union (PARU) held daily protests over eight weeks and spoke out against the Board’s aberrant decision. They successfully broke the racist blockade (not once but twice!) to ensure that students across the district could read the books of their choice.
Their book, BanThis: How One School Fought Two Book Bans and Won (And How You Can Too) is a blow-by-blow testament of arguments and counter-arguments that came up as PARU navigated the perilous waters of Christian Nationalism, White Supremacy, and the privilege of people who wanted to suppress student freedom to read, based on the false dog whistle of parental rights. The only rights these racists wanted was to decide for other parents how to raise their children.
As the rights of the American people are eroded and corrupted by the same government sworn to protect those rights, this is the time to stand with PARU and say, “Enough is enough!”
If you would like to know more about PARU and their outrageous battle for the freedom to read click here for articles and interviews about them. If you’d like to know more about teaching children the importance of intellectual freedom, check out the study to Ban This: https://lernerbooks.com/teaching_guides/964