11/18/2021
Bernedette Charmner **What I Learned at Last Night's Schoolboard Meeting**
Last night I passed out my “I Read Banned Books” t-shirts, signed up to speak, and found my spot in the auditorium. Once the public comments began, I found myself nodding and clapping for the views that I agreed with.
By the second speaker, I realized that the woman I was seated next to was on the other side of the issue. And I wondered “Should we move to different seats?”, not because I was opposed to sitting next to someone with different views, but because I was anxious about the social awkwardness of sitting through 3+ hours as we attempted to ignore each other’s clapping and the inevitable muttered comments that tend to slip from all of our lips as we listen to something that we passionately agree or disagree about.
When she corrected the pronunciation of “Abuismail”, I asked her to repeat it (I wanted to pronounce it correctly should I have the opportunity to speak to the board before the 12am comment cut-off time) and she smiled and told me she was Rabih Abuismail’s sister.
And so last night was very different from what I expected.
Because I sat next to her and she was so willing to chat and answer my questions, I began to get a glimpse of some of her perspectives and those of her brother. By being afforded the unique opportunity to view some of these events through her lens, I began to change my mind about a few things.
First, I do not now believe that Abuismail’s agenda was ever to remove LGBTQ books from the shelves. That may be the wish of others, but I do not believe it is his. His trigger is pe******ia, especially those books that might glorify s*x or violence against kids. That was his sister’s question about 33 Snowfish, which I had read. “Is it glorified?” If we listen to the book passage he read at the end of the meeting, it’s important to note that the content seemed to be a heteros*xual s*x scene between a male teacher and a female student. LGBTQ isn’t Abuismail’s trigger: statutory r**e is.
That’s absolutely not to diminish the importance of speaking up yesterday to defend LGBTQ books. Showing up to speak out and support our LGBTQ youth is always important and worthwhile. I was so grateful to see the outpouring of support from the community for our LGBTQ youth and so proud of those youth for coming out to stand up for their views. Abuismail’s sister was, too, smiling and applauding their signs. It was lovely to discover that on this point we had strong, common ground. We love our youth. All of them.
As I listened to the speakers, I began to listen to them with her perspective in mind, thinking more carefully about what I applauded. I thought about what it must be like to listen to one of your own family members being repeatedly rebuked for hours without any chance to respond. How would I feel in this same situation? As I listened to the comments, I began to notice that some were respectful, some vitriolic, and some downright demonizing.
And I began to reflect on the possibility that I had been guilty of demonization, a crime that we so often attribute to the other side. If your answering thought right now is “But Abuismail said XYZ…”, take a moment and examine that response. Remember that very little is accomplished if we do not give a person a chance to recant or apologize, and that demonization can turn a person into a demon. Imagine if Abuismail had been able to speak before the public comments began. Suppose he had apologized effusively for his comments about burning books and for his remarks about the library staff. Imagine the most thorough apology you can -- the one you would like to hear. Then ask the question: would the public remarks that followed have been any different? And if your next thought is “But Abuismail never would have given that apology” or "That apology would have been disingenuous political backpedaling", reread this paragraph again from the beginning.
His sister’s biggest stressor was that Abuismail had been denied the ability to speak before the meeting, denied the chance to explain, amend, or apologize. We all share a common desire to be heard and listened to. Our side was granted that yesterday in spades, but their side wasn’t. That wasn’t purposeful, but we ignore it at our own peril. People who feel unheard will begin to shout, and shouting is the precursor to fighting. For her part, Abuismail’s sister felt very passionately that everyone should be heard. At some point a woman came to the microphone with a very angry tone and I commented “Goodness this woman is angry.” “But she deserves to be heard,” responded Abuismail’s sister. It was my way of expressing my empathy toward her. It was her way of expressing empathy back.
Have we really given the other side a chance to be heard? They want passionately to share quotes with us that they find disturbing, and we are brushing them off. The conversation that they wish to have is a worthy conversation: if we can agree that Penthouse does not belong in a high school library periodical section, then we recognize that some material is not appropriate for a high school library because of its salacious nature. There is a line past which almost everyone can agree that something is inappropriate. And there is a line before which almost all of us would agree that something is appropriate. We need to find these lines and discuss the gray area in between them and how to handle this gray area – content labels, content warnings, discussion points, lists. We should entertain the idea that maybe not everything is perfect within the current system.
The oncoming ideological war that we are so fearful of is not simply going to go away because the schoolboard voted to rescind the motion. It will not simply go away by saying “there is a process already in place” and “trust the librarians”. I agree with both of those statements, but where I see a system that I trust, others see a system that they distrust, a system that has let through certain books that they are certain we would agree should be pulled if we would just read them.
Books like 'Call Me By Your Name'. I shared with Abuismail’s sister that I did, indeed, find it objectionable. It contains a love affair between a 17 and a 24 year old, has an erotic scene worthy of stalker charges, lots of graphic s*x scenes, and not enough consent. But here’s the quote I found most objectionable:
“The bruised and damaged peach, like a r**e victim, lay on its side on my desk, shamed, loyal, aching, and confused.”
That quote contained no explicit language, and yet it is so offensive in its suggestion that a r**e victim could be shamed or loyal. There is no danger in entertaining the idea that not all books should be on the school library shelves; such a conversation is not a slippery slope to banning LGBTQ literature and other representation in books. Even if you believe that Abuismail’s motivations were homophobic or a politically motivated witch hunt, it’s worth considering that we should not automatically make that assumption about everyone who holds these views and who raises these concerns. If we want people on the other side to listen and understand, we must also listen and understand and ask questions to pinpoint where our views diverge.
Because books foster empathy; but so do conversations.
