Bodycam footage obtained by The Eagle shows a police officer in an eighth grade classroom asking to see a copy of “Gender Queer,” and informing the teacher and school principal
Why is the police even involved in this. Unless the book in question is banned by law, or at least a court order, then there's no reason for the police to be involved.
This is one more case of the police overstepping their authority.
If the book is banned by law and this is how the police are triaging what they need to do to fight crime in Massachusetts, I hope the tax payers are getting their pitchforks out.
The school is trying to be helpful and do whatever is necessary to molify the cop, which is understandable. However, the school's best bet, once they became aware of the cop's intentions, would have been to whip out their phone cameras, refuse to answer questions, and refer him to the school board's lawyer. What's the cop going to do? He either has to leave and try to get a warrant, or he can double-down on a school-wide search, on camera, and look like an even bigger jackass.
Like everyone else, schools should remember to Shut The Fuck Up (tm).
This response is so important, a few bad elections locally are leading to these types of interactions. We have paid so much attention to national issues (rightfully) that we missed the LOCAL religious fascists at the door. We are on the verge of some very dark times unless a systemic understanding and change of state and local politics takes place quickly.
on top of doing nazi shit - in the 7 or so minutes he was covering his camera, he only uncovers it for the second or two that the teacher bends over in front of him. what a scum fuck
The cop is going about this wrong. The teacher that brought that book in is also wrong. They are wrong to assume the illustrations are appropriate for young children, I’m not talking about the queer aspect, it shows illustrations of oral sex. The teacher should be reprimanded by administrators, if no law was broken, the police shouldn’t be involved.
This was an eighth grade class room, they've been through sex-ed. Withholding knowledge about how their physical bodies work won't help them, and can create issues of their own. I thumbed through the pages (and you can too) and nothing was terribly pornagraphic.
Get real, “withholding knowledge ” …part of raising a child is understanding when to expose them to information, you do it everyday. This material is probably appropriate for a high school library.
I’ve read it. It’s designed for at least seniors in high school if not college age. It talks about visiting kink.com among other mature subjects. It’s an interesting exploration of someone who is trying to find themselves, but it isn’t eighth grade material.
Still, there’s no reason to send a cop to hunt it down like this is Farenheit 451.
Any questions any kid has about growing up, certainly including questions about their bodies and sexuality, should be easily answerable from an open shelf at the school library.