The appearance of two representatives from Moms For Liberty was lost among the many angry statements from parents of Conner High School students at last week’s Boone County Board of Education Meeting.
The louder discussion concerned reinstatement of a student at Conner High School who had formerly threatened other students. The Moms for Liberty group came to discuss reading material available in the Boone County Schools.
Moms for Liberty is a conservative, grassroots, nonprofit organization with chapters in 43 states. The momsforliberty.org website states they are “dedicated to fighting for the survival of America by unifying, educating and empowering parents to defend their parental rights at all levels of government.”
Mirna Eads, Campbell County Mom’s for Liberty chairperson, expressed concern about books available to students on subjects she said were inappropriate. She was specifically concerned with “Scythe” by Neal Schusterman, which she said was “about teens learning to kill people they perceived as having no purpose in society.”
Others books Eads said she wanted off the shelves were about child rape, normalizing abortion and various sexually explicit content.
“We are not about banning books” but rather want selections to be less explicit, Eads said at the meeting. The group intends to submit reviews of books they deem inappropriate to local school officials.
Karen Strayer will be leading a new Moms For Liberty group opening in Boone County. Strayer ran for a seat on the Boone County Board of Education in 2022 and lost to incumbent Karen Byrd.
The first public meeting of the Moms for Liberty group is scheduled for Jan. 26 at the Boone County Public Library in Burlington at 6:30 p.m. Strayer said the group is non-partisan and is for parents, grandparents and everyone interested in “making education great again.”
Strayer said that the group is concerned that society is “lowering the standards in our schools. We want our kids to excel.”
Another speaker at the meeting, a former student representative to the Board of Education, said that “many students actually go through these situations depicted in the books” that Eads said were unsuitable.
According to PEN America, another nonprofit group “founded in 1922 to defend and celebrate free expression,” reported that from mid-2021 to mid-2022, more than 2,500 books were banned in the U.S.
Most complaints were on the topics of race, gender or sexuality, according to PEN America, with the majority being books with subjects on LGBTQ+ issues and characters.
Of the 138 school districts in 32 states reported to have banned books in that period, Texas reported the highest number with over 751 books. Kentucky reported no books banned, according to the PEN report, which listed the Moms For Liberty group as one of three leaders in banning books in the U.S.