Every week there’s a new challenge to American civil liberties. 

Recently, one specific challenge has been the banning of books. Especially in my home state of Texas. This feels like a harkening back to the McCarthy era, where books and movies were being removed from circulation because there was even a whisper of disparate ideology or what they considered “subversive.”


But what did it mean to be subversive? 

“Seeking or intended to subvert an established system or institution.”

It started out as an attempt to root out communism and anti-American ideology. But then quickly morphed into a Salem-level witch hunt. Where even average Americans were being persecuted for being different- Jewish, queer, or simply outspoken. 


The Senate pressured libraries, publishers, and movie studios to remove works and blacklist people who were subversive. According to National Geographic, “Libraries and schools pulled classics like Huckleberry Finn, To Kill a Mockingbird, and The Canterbury Tales out of circulation when thought to promote radical ideas.” 


The radical ideas being what exactly? The very real history brutality and slavery in the antebellum South? Or is it the deep-rooted racism of the American legal system? What about the hypocrisy in religion and the religious elite?


It seemingly always comes back to white men in power looking to erase their brutal history in and attempt to wield their power. In America banning books has been a tactic to control people since the foundation of this country. PEN America outlined the timeline of book bannings in this country and the regimes that induced them. 


From the Puritans burning religious texts that they deemed “blasphemous,” to the turn of the century with the Comstock Act- where it became illegal to possess “obscene” or “immoral” texts. This was designed to ban both content about sexuality and birth control, which at the time was widely available via mail order.


So today, in 2025, Conservatives in power have dragged us back to the 1950s. Just like they’ve been talking about for years. 

“Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us. ”
— Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas

Each year, more books are being banned for simply being written by queer, black, or muslim authors. As the American Library Association notes, "the voices and lived experiences of LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC individuals made up 47 percent of those targeted in censorship attempts" in 2023. 


According to the Texas Tribune, Texas school districts banned around 540 books in the 2023–24 school year, many involving LGBTQ+ themes or race & identity content. Specifically, 44% included characters or people of color, and 39% included LGBTQ+ characters.


Books such as “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” “The Kite Runner,” “The Color Purple,” and “The Handmaid’s Tale,” among other acclaimed books, according to PEN America data.


This is genuinely horirrying to me. As a young, brown girl in Texas I don’t know what I would have done without the resources available at my public librarie. Or even the knowledge and openness of my school librarians. In a country seeking to delegitamize, and possibly even criminalize, my existence I look to my Gaysian elders. 


This year, legendary actor and activist George Takei has been named the Honorary Chair of Banned Books Week 2025. He’s said, “I remember all too well the lack of access to books and media that I needed growing up. First as a child in a barbed-wire prison camp, then as a gay young man in the closet, I felt confused and hungry for understanding about myself and the world around me.” 


This really hit home for me, as I read about the building of an ICE detention center at Fort Bliss- the same location of former Japanese internment camp site from World War II. 


And I’d like to reiterate that these book bannings don’t just happen at private institutions or schools. This is happening, once again, to publicly funded libraries.


Maia Kobabe, whose Gender Queer has been banned in many districts, said in this interview:

“When you try to ban or challenge a book about a marginalized experience… you are telling any young person who relates to that story… that they are not welcome in your community.”


That’s what’s happening. We’re being told that we’re not welcome any more. And I, for one, am so fucking mad. 


So if you’ve made it thus far, I’d like to leave you with some ways to be subversive. 

Specifically, ways to highlight Banned Book Week (10/5-10/11).  Here are some places to donate, books to buy, and bookish items to support real creatives.

My Favorite Independent Bookstores & Retailers 

Prianna Pathak