Book bans in public schools and libraries are not new by any means, but now they are extending to the Naval Academy. This is a decision made by the office of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in an attempt to comply with executive orders about DEI. Here’s the latest and why it matters.
What’s Going On With Executive Orders and the Naval Academy?
Jann. 29, President Trump signed an executive order eliminating “Radical Indoctrination” in kindergarten through twelfth-grade education.
One section of the order states, “In recent years, however, parents have witnessed schools indoctrinate their children in radical, anti-American ideologies while deliberately blocking parental oversight. Such an environment operates as an echo chamber, in which students are forced to accept these ideologies without question or critical examination.”
The order also claims that children are being made to question if they are transgender as well as, “compelled to adopt identities as either victims or oppressors solely based on their skin color and other immutable characteristics.”
The main idea of the order is about giving parents more freedom over the material that their children are being taught, and this has been a topic of discussion in the past few years regarding book bans. Most of the content that parents want control over is LGBTQ+ themes, racism and sexual content.
On April 4, The New York Times released an article about books being removed from the Naval Academy Library. Although the Naval Academy is a college, on March 28, Pete Hegseth informed the school that the executive order applied, which caused the removal of 381 books.
What is being removed?
The New York Times reported that these books among others were removed:
“I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou
“Memorializing the Holocaust” by Janet Jacobs
“How to Be Anti-Racist” by Ibram X. Kendi
“The Hate U Give” by Angie Thomas
“The Making of Black Lives Matter,” by Christopher J. Lebron
“How Racism Takes Place,” by George Lipsitz
Here’s the full list of books that were removed. Most if not all books on the list are either about racism, LGBTQ+ or feminism.
Why does it matter?
If book bans have been going on for so long, what makes this different? Well, the main difference is that the Naval Academy isn’t a kindergarten through twelfth-grade school. While many books that are banned in kindergarten through twelfth-grade school libraries are challenged due to parent concerns over sexually explicit material, this shouldn’t be an issue for colleges. This is an attempt at censorship and not a protection for parents to have more choice over their children’s education.
Book bans are not the only issue with the U.S. government censoring materials. According to the Associated Press, in March, thousands of historical images were flagged for removal in a DEI purge. These images were placed in a database to comply with archival laws, but the images that were removed included the first women to pass Marine infantry training along with other historical milestones.
Banning books will limit access to different ideas and won’t allow room for question or critical thinking. When thinking about the “anti-American ideologies” that the executive order is trying to prohibit, we must ask ourselves what it means to be American. Is it American to limit what our service members are allowed to read? Is it American to have only some ideas and thoughts being removed? Is it American to remove books that analyze history? Is it American to limit freedom of speech?
What Can You Do?
Besides the usual methods of raising awareness about issues like contacting your local representatives, posting on social media and protesting, a good way to challenge the banning of books is to read banned books and support your local libraries. Local libraries are a great study space, but they also offer movies and other resources beyond books. Along with this, it’s important to be aware of how academic libraries are handling banned books. Staying informed is important in the age of information being removed.
What are your thoughts on book bans? Do you have any favorite banned books? Let us know @VALLEYmag on X
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