The Evanston Nouveau Rotary Club at Bookends and Beginnings, Evanston, Ill. Photo: Gerald Farinas.
This week, beginning October 5, we enter Banned Books Week—a time to honor the freedom to read, the freedom to think, and the freedom to imagine. But we do so in an era where those very freedoms are being pushed back hard.
Across the country, parents and political groups are pressing for books to be pulled from the shelves of school and public libraries. And the pattern is unmistakable. The books most often targeted are about Black history and empowerment, the lives and struggles of people of color, and the stories of LGBTQ people. The language used is almost always indirect: “protecting children,” “mature themes,” “inappropriate content.” But the intent is clear—it is about control, exclusion, and silencing certain voices.
The numbers tell the story.
According to PEN America, in 2023–24 alone there were more than 10,000 instances of book bans in U.S. public schools.
And the American Library Association reports that in 2024 there were 821 separate attempts to censor materials in schools and libraries, targeting 2,452 distinct titles.
These are not isolated disputes. This is a movement, coordinated and deliberate.
And what are the books being silenced? They include powerful, acclaimed works like:
* Flamer by Mike Curato
* All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson
* Ban This Book by Alan Gratz
* Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
* I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
* The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
* Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
* The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
* Looking for Alaska by John Green
* The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
These are not fringe books. They are modern classics, widely taught, widely read, and deeply meaningful. To erase them is to erase the opportunity for readers—especially young readers—to engage with voices that broaden their world.
For my part, I am almost absolutist in opposing the censorship of literature and art, so long as the work is not created by exploiting vulnerable people. A democracy cannot breathe if it stifles the voices of its writers and artists.
That is why, yes, I even believe books like Mein Kampf should remain available. Not because I endorse it, but because the only way to confront dangerous ideas is to bring them into the open, where they can be studied, critiqued, and defeated.
On my website, GeraldFarinas.com, I openly share the titles I read. And I know that many of those books would be banned in certain communities. That is exactly why I share them. Because freedom to read is not freedom from discomfort.
Democracy requires discomfort. It requires us to wrestle with hard histories and painful truths.
When we allow censorship to dictate which books are permitted, we are not protecting anyone.
We are impoverishing the public square.
We are closing doors to conversation.
We are creating silence where there should be dialogue.
So this Banned Books Week, let us affirm that a democracy worth living in is one where the shelves are full, where the stories are many, and where no one has the power to decide for all of us which voices may or may not be heard.
Because when a book is banned, the loss is not only to the author.
The loss is to the conversation that will never happen.
And that is a loss our democracy cannot afford.
