Via Towleroad, an interesting -and to me, local- case of censorship.

Brent Hartinger‘s novel Geography Club, which chronicles the relationship of a lonely gay student and an online chat buddy who turns out to be an athlete at his high school, has been pulled from a Tacoma, Washington area school district’s library shelves.

“We want to send a strong consistent message to all our students that meeting individuals via the Internet is extremely high-risk behavior,” [Superintendent Patti] Banks wrote in a letter Nov. 2 to two parents who requested the book’s removal.

The Superintendent’s reasoning doesn’t exactly jibe with the objections voiced over the book. Those protesting said:

They wrote that reading the book could result in a “casual and loose approach to sex,” encourage use of Internet porn, and the physical meeting of people through chatrooms.

Notice that the whole “EEK! The Internet!” objection is dead last, and the sexuality reasons are front-and-center. What a shock. Even more disgusting is that only two parents objected to Geography Club. Tacoma isn’t exactly a backwater school district; I’m fairly shocked that it only takes two parents to remove a book.

The author makes a particularly salient point, in my opinion:

“The reason gay teens are drawn to the Internet is that’s a safe place to explore their identity without being harassed or bullied,” Hartinger said. “It’s ironic my book would be pulled for this reason, contributing to this atmosphere of silence and gay intolerance.”

Exactly. Hartinger hits on the New Truth of exploring the world, that the Internet is more and more of a factor in kid’s social lives and awareness. And no more so than in the lives of gay teens, who are definitely not encouraged to be open and forthright with their questions and thoughts- and most definitely not about their fears.