According to purported emails between a parent and Llano High School Principal Scott Patrick, administrators figure it would take approximately 30 days to review each of the 200 books parents have flagged for sexually inappropriate content. As only nine months are considered work months, that equates to about 22 and a half years of book reviewing.
The books in question will apparently stay on the shelves until each review is completed, despite the fact that Texas passed the READER Act in June of 2023, which actually requires schools to remove material that is "sexually explicit, harmful, pervasively vulgar, or educationally unsuitable."
Mary Elizabeth Castle, director of government relations for Texas Values, says that means 22 separate groups of kids will have access to explicit content, including extremely graphic sex scenes.
"It's very disappointing that this high school is trying to circumvent a policy that we've been trying to put in place to keep these sexually explicit books out of school libraries," she laments.
And Castle notes that this school's location is no coincidence. Llano, Texas, she says, has already had "a lot of problems" and even legal trouble over the inappropriate content featured in the children's sections of the public libraries there.
At the high school, one book called into question is "Call Me By Your Name," in which a homosexual fantasy is detailed. The review committee voted 7-0 to remove it after one month.
"A lot of the books that we're seeing in the school library that not only have adult content but explicit images can have long-lasting negative effects on kids -- how they see relationships in the future, sexual disfunction, even becoming violent," Castle warns. "The studies have shown that viewing pornographic materials at a young age has very negative effects on these kids when they become adults."
Having homosexual propaganda on the shelves at public schools has aided the Left in its effort to equate sexual choices to immutable traits, making "pride" a major modern-day civil rights movement.
U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R), however, believes school choice is the civil rights movement of our time.
Governor Greg Abbott (R) has been trying to pass individual savings accounts for school choice in the state, but in his most recent attempt to do so, 21 Republicans joined with Democrats to defeat the measure.
Mandy Drogin of the Texas Public Policy Foundation says only one group of people is against it.
"The only demographic that is not supportive of school choice, on the whole, is white liberals," she observes. "Oftentimes, those elitists that have the mentality that they know better, they know what's best for a kid -- they see children as a collective, as opposed to individuals that parents see their children as."
With primary elections coming up, Drogin thinks Sen. Cruz can play a role in helping school choice candidates get elected.
"There's definitely an alignment between Sen. Cruz, Gov. Abbott, [and] the lieutenant governor," she notes. "I am cautiously optimistic that it'll be great for the parents and, most importantly, the kids of Texas that are trying to get an education."
Because the legislature only meets once every two years, the issue of school choice will not come up until next year, unless a special session is called.
