Opinion: January 2025 Book Appeals 3

Drama by Raina Telgemeier

This is the 3rd Post in this series of Reconsideration appeals by Mrs. Bence. This is an interesting submission because this was submitted a couple of years ago. Mrs. Bence heard about it because a local Mom had complained about it at school board meetings. That local Mom is now the elected Columbia County School Board representative for District 4, Katie Allen. Katie Allen was very outspoken about this particular book when her then Middle School child checked the book out from her teacher’s classroom library. There are gay characters in the book and there is a stage-kiss between two of the male characters. Katie Allen was quite active in her opposition to this book and others, claiming it was sexual content. She also is representing herself in a lawsuit against the Columbia County School District over this issue claiming “parental rights.” I have not read her lawsuit since it is 300+ pages long and would cost me over $100 to download it. Based on reporting from Augusta Press though, the District’s lawyers have maintained that in her lawsuit, Katie Allen is so broad in what she considers “sexual”, that it would make even the teaching of Shakespeare and biology difficult. As of now, it’s my understanding that the local judge ruled on behalf of the District and Katie Allen has appealed that decision, so the drama continues.

Drama by Raina Telgemeier

Karin’s Summary: Callie is an 8th Grader that loves theater. She is the set designer for her school’s production of Moon Over Mississippi. The production of the play is a backdrop for the real drama playing out in real life between the different friendships and relationships that one might expect in Middle School.

Prior Placement: Children’s Graphic Novels

Librarian’s Recommendation: Move out of Children’s Graphic Novels and into Middle Ground

Mrs. Bence’s Preference: Adult Books

Mrs Bence (transcript):

This is Drama. It's a resubmission from two and a half years ago. The theme of this book is eighth graders. One steady and changing partners constantly. They're planning for graduation from eighth grade and eighth grade prom. And in childhood psychology, I remember way back in the 70s, we learned that middle school is the time to develop same sex friendships. Even though there are crushes. And some pairing up is secondary to the stepping block toward healthy heterosexual friendships later by having your same sex friends. So this is completely skimmed up or bypassed. And this developmental stage is completely ignored in this book. Instead of being preoccupied with sports, friendships, family, hobbies, this book is saturated with who's going with whom. And this is a graphic book. There's a cell phone conversation late at night in the bedroom as the parent does not even take the phone. No parental supervision. The kids are running their own life. Comedy or comics like these are a good way to break down the social mores. When we laugh at some of these situations they're in. Pairing up the two men, the two boys and the two girls. Callie is constantly surprised by the next gay discovery. But she keeps discovering more and more of her friends are gay. Page 10, graphic mouth kissing not age appropriate. Page 19, normalizing deep romance. Not appropriate. Page 58. It is not surprising we've seen the boom in homosexuality. When a child feels particularly close to their own gender, they begin to think they're homosexual. From books Just like this. So I think this one I recommended going up from juvenile to middle ground or adult. I said adult for supervision. So it would go from. It's in ju. It's in juvie now juvenile. In fact, I think there's a couple copies in juvenile. It should go up to adult for supervision. Very convincing that most of your friends are homosexual. And the E probably are homosexual. It's a very big bestseller. Drama is the big bestseller.

Mrs. Bence asserts that according to child psychology classes in the 1970s, middle school was noted as a time to develop same-sex relationships. I’m not sure what they were teaching in the 1970s but according to this article I found on Pub Med written in 2008, early adolescence is actually the time when opposite-sex relationships become increasingly more important. In other words, it’s normal for 8th graders to start having relationships with their opposite-sex peers. Kids will have crushes and will begin having boyfriends/girlfriends. It is also not very unusual in our public middle schools for kids to not only know that they are gay in 8th grade, but to be open about it. Kids, even LGBTQ+ kids, still have same-sex friends as well. Social relationships, including best friends and budding romantic relationships, are very important to middle school students. Even if a kid doesn’t have a boyfriend/girlfriend, these kids are all buzzing with who is “dating” who. It was the same way when I was in Middle School in the late 80’s.

The next issue is the kissing…. Page 10 has a kiss, however it’s not drawn as an open mouth kiss and it’s just 1 frame. Although I’m not a fan of the guidelines, according to the Middle Ground criteria, a brief kiss on the lips is allowed in Middle Ground. This kiss meets that criteria. Mrs. Bence claims that page 19 is normalizing deep romance and also has an issue that the kids were on the phone late at night. In the book, Greg got back together with his girlfriend, and his comments were “Well…. Last night, when I got home, my phone rang, and it was Bonnie. She was crying. It was hard to understand what she was saying, but I couldn’t just hang up. She and I talked until her phone died around midnight. I’m supposed to see her later, after school.” I remember sneaking late night phone calls with my friends in Middle School and we didn’t even have cell phones back in the day. Oh, we had some relationship drama back then too… who remembers 3-ways calls and who skated with who during couples skate at the roller rink? LOL My point is, this is nothing new.

I’m glad that Mrs. Bence also brings up the popularity of this book though. It is rated a 5/5 on the popularity scale. Between the three library branches (Evans, Grovetown, Harlem), the County owns 7 copies of this book. I’ve never actually seen it on the shelf at the main Evans branch and I’ve looked several times. You would think if the parents of Columbia County had such big concerns about this book, that there would be an uproar about it that it’s still on the shelves… that parents would forbid their children from reading it, and it would never get checked out. That’s just not the case though. Why is that? Because many parents of kids in Columbia County are fine with their kids reading this book and are also OK with its original placement in Children’s Graphic Novels. I think many would also be OK with it in Middle Ground too but if it’s the only graphic novel in Middle Ground, it will make it obvious that this book was targeted.

Mrs. Bence also voices her fear that kids will read this book and become gay. Nobody reads a book and becomes gay though. I’ve read books with serial killers and assassins, yet I didn’t become either one. This book does serve as a mirror though for many of our Middle School students who are figuring out peer relationships. They are learning how to be friends and accept each other, even if their friend is gay. How to work together in groups even when they don’t get along. It’s a great book and very relevant for today’s kids!