{"id":5012,"date":"2020-07-01T10:11:06","date_gmt":"2020-07-01T15:11:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/?page_id=5012"},"modified":"2025-07-30T11:47:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T15:47:12","slug":"beyond-magenta","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/bannedbooks\/beyond-magenta\/","title":{"rendered":"Banned Books 2025 &#8211; Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div class=\"marsha-row mt-4 mb-4 flex flex-wrap -mx-2 lg:-mx-6  justify-start border-0 border-gray-100 first:mt-0\">\n\t\n<p><!-- *  START LEFT COLUMN  *--><div class=\"columns w-full lg:w-3\/12  lg:px-6    mt-6\">\n<div class=\"\">\n\n<h2>Links<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a id=\"current\" href=\"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/bannedbooks\/bannedbooks-2025\/author\/\">2025 Author<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/bannedbooks\/bannedbooks-2025\/title\/\">2025 Title<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/bannedbooks\/\">Banned Books Home<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><hr \/><\/p>\n<h2>Cover<\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/files\/2020\/07\/beyond-magenta.jpg\" alt=\"beyond magenta: transgender teens speak out\" width=\"1400\" height=\"2003\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2679\" \/><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/cabellcounty.ent.sirsi.net\/client\/en_US\/cabell\/search\/results?qu=Beyond+magenta&amp;te=&amp;rt=false%7C%7C%7CTITLE%7C%7C%7CTitle\">Held at Cabell County Public Library.<\/a><\/p>\n<p><!-- *** ** END LEFT COLUMN ** ***-->\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/p><p><!-- *** ** START RIGHT COLUMN ** **--><div class=\"columns w-full lg:w-9\/12  lg:px-6    mt-6\">\n<div class=\"\">\n\n<p><strong>Marshall University does not ban books!  The information is provided to let people know what has been banned\/challenged elsewhere.<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2>2025<\/h2>\n<p>On October 14, the Christian nationalist organization Conservatives for the Commonwealth began a political mailer campaign supporting Amendment 2 on the Kentucky ballot. The amendment would allow public money to fund private schools. The mailers pulled excerpts from <strong>Beyond Magenta<\/strong>, <strong>Shine<\/strong>, and <strong>Lucky<\/strong> out of context to manufacture outrage regarding books in public school libraries. On October 16, Ballard County Schools (KY) announced they were banning all three titles. Superintendent Casey Allen said they had not received any complaints about the books and the decision was in response to the mailer.<\/p>\n<h2>2023<\/h2>\n<p>Starting on September 13, members of the group Let\u2019s Talk Hempfield began reading excerpts from <strong>Flamer<\/strong> and other titles during the public comments section of Hempfield School District board meetings in Landisville, PA. On November 22, they submitted seven police reports against the Hempfield High School, claiming that <strong>Flamer<\/strong>, <strong>Push<\/strong> by Sapphire, and <strong>Beyond Magenta<\/strong> by Susan Kuklin were \u201cpornography\u201d and \u201cobscene material.\u201d  The district attorney investigated, determined the books were neither pornographic nor obscene, and did not file charges. While nine books were targeted during public comments and through police reports, no formal requests for reconsideration were ever submitted.<\/p>\n<p>In December, Central Bucks School District (PA) received challenges to five titles with LGBTQIA+ characters, including <strong>Beyond Magenta<\/strong>. All challenged titles were withdrawn from circulation.<\/p>\n<p>Concerned Parents for Nixa (MO) held a rally during which Andy Wells from No Left Turn in Education called for the removal of books he characterized as illegal pornography. This culminated in challenges to 18 titles at Nixa Public Schools, 12 of which were withdrawn from district libraries, including <strong>Beyond Magenta<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h2>2022<\/h2>\n<p>Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was considered to be sexually explicit.<\/p>\n<p>At Siloam Springs (AR) High School, three parents submitted a formal challenge to remove <strong>Beyond Magenta<\/strong> from the library. A committee reviewed the challenge and decided that the book should<br \/>\nstay. The parents then appealed to the school board, which voted to remove the book from the school\u2019s library.<\/p>\n<p>A group of 35 people came to the Victoria (TX) Public Library to demand that a list of LGBTQIA+ titles be removed from the library\u2019s collection. They said they believed children\u2019s brain development would be damaged by materials \u201cabout gender ambiguity, transgender topics, or books on sexuality.\u201d They provided a packet of requests to reconsider 21 titles and said there were at least 126 other items they were \u201cconcerned about.\u201d The library board voted to retain all challenged titles.<\/p>\n<h2>2020<\/h2>\n<p>Challenged for LGBTQIA+ content, for &#8220;its effect on any young people who would read it,&#8221; and for concerns that it was sexually explicit and biased.<\/p>\n<h2>2016<\/h2>\n<p>Challenged for being anti-family, unsuited to age group, offensive language, homosexuality, sex education, political viewpoint, religious viewpoint, and other reasons (&#8220;wants to remove from collection to ward off complaints&#8221;).<\/p>\n<h2>On These Pages<\/h2>\n<p>A <strong>Banned<\/strong> book has been removed from a library, classroom, etc.<br \/>\nA <strong>Challenged<\/strong> book has been requested to be removed from a library, classroom, etc.<\/p>\n<h2>For additional information contact<\/h2>\n<p>Ron Titus, <a href=\"mailto:titus@marshall.edu\">titus@marshall.edu<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"tel:304-696-6575\">304-696-6575<\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Last updated<\/h2>\n<p>July 30, 2025<\/p>\n<p><!-- ** ** END RIGHT COLUMN *** *-->\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n<p><!-- *** * END FULL PAGE DIV * *** --><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":784,"featured_media":0,"parent":2039,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-full-width.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-5012","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/784"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5012"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5012\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15297,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5012\/revisions\/15297"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}