A school district in northeast Florida must put back in libraries three dozen books as part of a settlement reached Thursday with students and parents who sued over what they said was an unlawful decision to limit access to dozens of titles containing LGBTQ+ content.

Under the agreement the School Board of Nassau County must restore access to three dozen titles including “And Tango Makes Three,” a children’s picture book based on a true story about two male penguins that raised a chick together at New York’s Central Park Zoo. Authors Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson were plaintiffs in the lawsuit against the district, which is about 35 miles (about 60 kilometers) northeast of Jacksonville along the Georgia border.

The suit was one of several challenges to book bans since state lawmakers last year passed, and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law, legislation making it easier to challenge educational materials that opponents consider pornographic and obscene. Last month six major publishers and several well-known authors filed a federal lawsuit in Orlando arguing that some provisions of the law violate the First Amendment rights of publishers, authors and students.

  • Jojo, Lady of the West
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    12 months ago

    Legislatures are elected and they can’t be expected to know how a law can be interpreted.

    Isn’t that, like, the fucking job? CEOs can’t be expected to know if a given task will lose money for the company. Doesn’t matter if they were put in that position by a popular vote or a board vote

    • @PriorityMotif
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      12 months ago

      The people who wrote the constitution could have never imagined how it could be interpreted 250 years later.

      • Jojo, Lady of the West
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        12 months ago

        They also wouldn’t have to worry about losing their seat in the Senate for passing a law that was reinterpreted 250 years later.