I write most of the articles here, and I have to admit, it’s a bit amusing that I had to fact-check myself—but hey, everyone makes mistakes. During the November 19th school board public comment session, I spoke after a teacher and a few students addressed the removal of certain books. While sitting in the audience, I searched the school catalog and thought I had found the titles the students mentioned.

However, I was mistaken. What I actually found were commentaries about those books—not the books themselves. I’ll share two screenshots below to show how easy it was to make this error. That said, I believe it’s important to set the record straight.

On a related note, I find it ironic that the books in question are so banned that commentaries about them are available at The Woodlands High School.

Why were these books removed?   The Handmaiden's Tale was removed by the reconsideration committee after a citizen submitted a reconsideration form which can be found here:  https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uuBW6OwqjuwEdX3isP9cOReYCJgWRcvX/view?usp=drivesdk

Slaughterhouse Five, however, was not removed by formal reconsideration.  No citizen had filed a reconsideration request asking the library committee to remove the book.  The book is listed on the district website as removed as part of the Library Materials Informal Reconsideration.   This means the librarians looked at the policy and decided that these books did not meet the policy. 

What does Selection Criteria 1 mean?

I’m not entirely sure, but I believe that we are to refer to the policy from 2023, that has since been revised, and the book does not meet selection criteria-based on number 1 here:

Clear as mud?  I was a little surprised that Slaughterhouse Five was removed from Conroe ISD libraries, but Perks of a Wallflower was not, so I read it last weekend to see for myself what problems might be in the book.  Here are some of the possible reasons for removal:

1. Anti-American? If it was removed because the book was believed to be anti-American (I did not get that) then how in the world is White Fragility still in the libraries?  I do not think this is why it was removed.
2. Sex?  Most of the sex content was pretty vague such as, “We had sex and it was nice,” or “We made the headboard sing.”  There was however one part of the book where the main character is in a pornographic book shop and describes a pornographic image, he finds that involves a Shetland pony.  My guess is that since this kind of behavior is illegal in Texas, this may be why the book was removed. 

If this content was the reason why Slaughterhouse Five was removed, then how is The Color Purple still in the school libraries with the intense rape/incest/abuse situation?  Perhaps because abuse was portrayed as abhorrent behavior?  How does the content not match with the specific standard in “Selection Criteria 1”?  I think there could be more transparency here to help students understand what is going on here.  The students seem to think that the books were removed due to some political or religious motivation when board members did not directly remove this book at all.  Transparency would also give citizens peace of mind that classic books are not being removed to make the policy look bad.