Even today books are banned in the U.S.
By Rebecca Hersher, NPR
Banned Books Week kicked off Sunday: Each year, the American Library Association takes this week to sponsor events all over the country to talk about the books that shock, offend, and generally make Americans uncomfortable.
Violence and curse words are two of the top three reasons books get banned in the U.S.
The third reason is sexual content. For example, the “Fifty Shades of Grey” series has been frequently banned from libraries for its explicit descriptions of intercourse.
But when it comes to kids, the bar for inappropriate sexual language is much lower. In 2013, the top banned book in America was the kid’s story “Captain Underpants”. It was most frequently challenged for potty language and toilet humor.
That’s how a sex education book for children, titled “It’s Perfectly Normal”, became one of the most banned books of the past two decades. The book is meant to teach children 10 and over about sexual health, emotional health and relationships, and contains sections on puberty, pregnancy and sexual orientation.