Progressive org demands school district ban the Bible after it banned other “obscene” books

The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) is demanding that a Colorado school district ban the Bible based on the same criteria that led the district to ban three books for “inappropriate sexual and violent content.”

The national nonprofit organization, which advocates for the separation of church and state, made the request last week in support of a parent in Academy School District 20 in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Related:

Conservatives demand the Bible be put back in schools after it was banned for vulgarity & violence

The crowd at the Utah Capitol said that the book-banning law wasn’t meant to ban the Bible.

In May, the school district authorized principals to remove three books, including the novel Push by Sapphire, from school library shelves after an anti-LGBTQ+ conservative group, Advocates for D20 Kids, requested they be banned for “obscene” content. In response, a concerned parent in the district requested that the Bible be removed from school libraries based on the same criteria.

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In a June 22 letter to Academy School District 20 superintendent Tom Gregory, FFRF staff attorney Chris Line cited numerous examples of violent and sexually explicit Bible passages. Line described the Bible as “the single-most weaponized piece of writing on the planet, responsible for unjust wars, genocide, anti-semitism, violent extremism, subjugation of women and pervasive racism.”

FFRF requested that the district “either ban the bible based on the criteria it has used to ban other books with similar sexual and violent content, or cease banning books and return the banned books to school shelves.”

“​​The district cannot ban books because it disagrees with the viewpoint expressed while allowing other inappropriate books because it supports their viewpoint,” Line wrote.

“We want to make it clear that we are adamantly opposed to banning books,” FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor said. “But the religious zealots can’t have it both ways. They can’t scour books looking for sexual references or content to offend them — regardless of literary or social value and context — then say that the true obscenity found in the bible must be judged differently.”

In his letter to Gregory, Line described book-banning crusades by groups like Advocates for D20 Kids as “manufactured, with pre-made lists of books and quotes circulated by self-righteous grandstanders who are hostile to critical thinking.” He criticized such groups for selectively targeting passages in works with greater literary value.  

Line also noted that “removal of the bible would not constitute hostility toward Christianity or religion.”

“The District must hold religious texts to the same standards it holds all other library books, review them, and, if they contain the same inappropriate content as the bible, must also remove them under the District’s standards,” he wrote. “Removing the bible for its obscenity or graphic sexual content based on neutral criteria is not religious discrimination.”

“The best solution,” Line added, “is to leave a diversity of viewpoints in school libraries, and trust students to explore complex topics themselves by not banning books from school libraries.”

This isn’t the first time the Bible has been challenged in response to local book bans targeting works by and about LGBTQ+ people and people of color. In late May, a Utah school district decided to remove the Bible from elementary and junior high school libraries after a parent challenged the religious text under a state law banning “pornographic or indecent” material in schools.