Credit to Michaela Manfull

Ray Bradbury’s novel “Fahrenheit 451” depicts a dystopian society in which literature is controlled and suppressed by an authoritarian government. Books are deemed contraband and are liable to be violently censored with streams of flame issued by law enforcement. “Fahrenheit 451” is also among one of the most challenged books in the United States, with concerned citizens around the nation calling for it to be removed from the shelves of school libraries due to its obscene language and disturbing content. This reflects a larger trend of book banning in the United States which has only grown in recent years.

“In Florida, book banning has become an issue, much more so than the state of Maine, where I usually live,” Lois Lowry, author of the novel “The Giver,” said. “A lot of school classrooms have had to remove all the books in the classroom, and libraries have had to remove a lot of books.”

The term “book banning” is a bit of a misnomer. There are no books that are actually illegal to own in the United States, excluding those containing illegal materials. When people talk about book banning, they are referring to the practice of schools making a book unavailable to be borrowed. This usually happens as a result of a concerned third party approaching their local school board to challenge the book’s appropriateness. If the board deems the book unsuitable, the book will be removed from the district’s libraries and classrooms. While it’s not quite as severe as a flat-out ban, this practice is still very concerning. School is the only way for many students to reliably access books. By taking some books off of school shelves for their disagreeable content, students are being deprived of the unique perspectives held within them.

“In order for our students to be informed about issues, they need to have access to all of the arguments, all of the sides, all of the information, so they can make their own informed decisions rather than what we tell them to believe, or we prevent them from even having the possibility of believing.” Luke Lammers, the Director of Curriculum for FHSD said.

Here in Missouri, the fight for and against book banning is largely a story in the making. In 2022, the Missouri Senate passed Senate Bill 775, which prohibited the distribution of materials containing sexually explicit content in school settings. This sparked a wave of school districts taking books they deemed inappropriate out of their libraries. The Wentzville School District took this to the extreme, temporarily banning over 200 books from their libraries, though most were returned after they received backlash from authors and illustrators. In August of last year, several policies were implemented by the FHSD board allowing for the challenging and banning of books within the district. While the board has not banned any books yet, this could change at a moment’s notice. The prospect of North’s libraries being censored may soon become a reality, a cause for great concern to some.

“If we think about a world where book bans are normal, then we’re talking “Fahrenheit 451”, we’re talking no more democracy,” Justine Pas, a professor of English at Lindenwood University said.