Banning a children’s board book comes off as frivolous, innocuous, and even preposterous, when, in fact, it is a clear indication of how threatened the powers that be are to free thought.
When I was asked to write J is for Justice: An Activism Alphabet, I did not intend to write just any ABC book. I set out to write a book that would allow activist parents, like myself, and other grown-ups to teach the children in their lives the alphabet through key figures and terms in social justice. The reason J is for Justice, beautifully illustrated by María Díaz Perera, was one of the most frequently banned books for the 2024-25 school year, had nothing to do with the alphabet, but the content I present.
It’s been a few months since I received a text from someone asking, “Is this you?” Then sending me a link to a People magazine article highlighting a PEN America report on books that were challenged during the 2024-2025 school year. I was flabbergasted. Friends have asked if the ban was a surprise. Well, it wasn’t. But it is still shocking.
Do you have any idea how many children’s board books there are? Tens of thousands. And somehow my book was pulled from the mountain for a ban. PEN America cites J is for Justice as banned on a national level because the Department of Defense includes it on a list of 596 books it banned in January of 2025. Military.com links to documents from an ACLU challenge to that ban which lists all the books. Many of the books banned address race, diversity, inclusion, and gender. What in these books and J is for Justice is so dangerous for children? Perhaps the idea that we can talk about issues of race, diversity, inclusion, and gender?
A librarian friend recommends J is for Justice to parents who want a book to help them talk to their kids about how ICE and our federal government are traumatizing our communities. I don’t talk about either, but do talk about the underlying ideals of talking to neighbors and dreaming and hoping for a better world. Which explains the disturbing Trump administration response to the ACLU’s lawsuit: “Government speech is immune from scrutiny under the First Amendment’s Free Speech Clause because when the government engages in speech, it is constitutionally permissible for it to select the message it wishes to convey.” The federal government believing that they can set standards on what we read is why the banning of books, much less a children’s board book, should be seen as dangerous. If not, a red line being crossed.
The same year the Department of Defense did the deed, the Supreme Court let a book ban stand for a small portion of the country, thus increasing the chances for book bans to come for everyone. The ban was localized in a redder part of the country than Chicago or Illinois. But as a reproductive justice activist, I know all too well that what happens in deep red USA is too often overlooked and waved away as, “This is what they voted for.”
Except that ban, whether of a book or an abortion, never stays localized. It creeps out, inch by inch, until you are sitting in bluest Chicago wondering why the wait for an abortion is so long or why a certain book is being kept from your child at school.
Throughout J is for Justice, the message to young people is, “You have a voice and you can and should use it, let me show you how.” C is for Clipboard to hold your petition. Y is for yelling because your voice is powerful. One of the earliest letters I wrote was for Z. Z is for zigzag, and I knew the illustration needed to show that political victories are not straight lines. That there are small wins and setbacks along the way, peaks and valleys, or a winding road up to a mountain summit. And we get there together.
Let’s review that quote from the Trump administration again: “when the government engages in speech, it is constitutionally permissible for it to select the message it wishes to convey.” Martha Allen, Co-Director of Women’s Institute for Freedom of the Press, shared that, “Freedom of the press, free speech, and the ability of the public to communicate without government interference is one of our most precious rights and is necessary for a democracy.”
The administration deciding to ban J is for Justice and 595 other books not only means they do not agree with the content within each book, but they want views on diversity, inclusion, race, and gender to come from the government period. The banning of books requires our attention. To quote Allen, “How can a children’s alphabet book be flagged for banning in Virginia and the U.S. Department of Defense when it simply has such things as ‘J is for Justice’ and ‘R is for Rainbow’? There should be no censorship from the government whatsoever. Our Constitution upholds this freedom and without this right we will begin to lose our democratic foundation.”
I am a Chicagoan and as such am privileged that in Illinois, we have a ban on book banning. Well, at least if a public library wants to ban a book based on political ideology, then they forfeit state library funds. Choices.
Except that informal book bans can and do occur—librarians can simply not order books they know have caused issues elsewhere in the country. Say perhaps a list of 596 books that the federal government doesn’t like being left off the incoming year’s budget request. When teachers are losing their credentials over challenging book bans, there is ample professional pressure to just not buy or assign banned books. It’s not ideology if you fear for your job, is it?
Illinois does ban books. Incarcerated people have limitations on which books they can read. Some are reasonable, like how to build explosives, but books being banned are not limited to what any list states. Chicago Books to Women in Prison, an all-volunteer organization that sends free books to women and trans people in prison nationwide, shared that “incarcerated readers often face additional restrictions that vary from prison to prison and sometimes from one staff member to another.” They have seen coloring books, journals, and books on origami banned.
One woman served by CBWP captured the importance of access to books in a letter to the organization, “Thank you for sending us books. If the warden knew what a great escape reading was, he would definitely ban all books.” Which makes one presume that book bans are not just about limiting information but also making incarceration as inhumane as possible.
We find ourselves living in a time where, according to PEN America, banning nonfiction books “rose from 14% to a startling 29% of all banned titles” in one year. AI summarizes everything we look up on the internet (often incorrectly) and universities, once the bastion of learning, push AI as a job skill because corporate donors ask for it. We are in a time where simply reading a book is seen as transgressive and treated with suspicion. The increase in book bans, especially of nonfiction books on art, insects, and skeletons signals the throes of a ruling class and administration working against its citizens instead of protecting our right to read what we want for ourselves and to our children.
The printing press is one of the most impactful inventions of humankind. The internet was supposed to democratize information. Yet our government fails time and again to protect our access to information and learning. Thus, forcing us to acknowledge that a central target is knowledge itself. We can see this by attacks on public education, including the defunding of higher education, public libraries, and the banning of specific books.
Again, Allen: “Book banning is a dangerous direction for a democracy.” While I understand the sentiment and do wear the badge of the author of a banned book with pride, it is not something to celebrate. Rather this recognition fuels my rage to fight harder to save our democracy. I hope you will join me. Buy, read, and gift banned books. Vote.
J Is for Justice: An Activism Alphabet
By Veronica I. Arreola
Illustrated by María Díaz Perera
Sunbird Books
Published May 10, 2023
