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A mom's campaign to ban library books divided a Texas town -- and her own family
Weston Brown had given up challenging his mother’s anti-LGBTQ beliefs. But that was before she started coming after library books.
GRANBURY, Texas — Weston Brown was scrolling through Twitter last month when he came across a video that made his chest tighten. It showed a woman at a school board meeting in North Texas, calling on district leaders to ask for forgiveness. “Repentance is the word that’s on my heart,” she said near the start of the video.
For months, the woman in the clip had been demanding that the Granbury Independent School District ban from its libraries dozens of books that contained descriptions of sex or LGBTQ themes — books that she believed could be damaging to the hearts and minds of students. Unsatisfied after a district committee that she served on voted to remove only a handful of titles, the woman filed a police report in May accusing school employees of providing pornography to children, triggering a criminal investigation by Hood County
Now, in the video that Weston found online, she was telling the school board that a local Christian pastor, rather than librarians, should decide which books should be allowed on public school shelves. “He would never steer you wrong,” she said.
Weston, 28, said his heart was racing as he watched and rewatched the video — and not only because he opposes censorship. He’d instantly recognized the speaker.
It was his mother, Monica Brown.
The same woman, he said, who’d removed pages from science books when he was a child to keep him and his siblings from seeing illustrations of male and female anatomy. The woman who’d always warned that reading the wrong books or watching the wrong movies could open the door to sinful temptation. And the one, he said, who’d effectively cut him off from his family four years ago after he came out as gay.
MORE: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/moms-campaign-divided-texas-town-family-rcna42031
For months, the woman in the clip had been demanding that the Granbury Independent School District ban from its libraries dozens of books that contained descriptions of sex or LGBTQ themes — books that she believed could be damaging to the hearts and minds of students. Unsatisfied after a district committee that she served on voted to remove only a handful of titles, the woman filed a police report in May accusing school employees of providing pornography to children, triggering a criminal investigation by Hood County
Now, in the video that Weston found online, she was telling the school board that a local Christian pastor, rather than librarians, should decide which books should be allowed on public school shelves. “He would never steer you wrong,” she said.
Weston, 28, said his heart was racing as he watched and rewatched the video — and not only because he opposes censorship. He’d instantly recognized the speaker.
It was his mother, Monica Brown.
The same woman, he said, who’d removed pages from science books when he was a child to keep him and his siblings from seeing illustrations of male and female anatomy. The woman who’d always warned that reading the wrong books or watching the wrong movies could open the door to sinful temptation. And the one, he said, who’d effectively cut him off from his family four years ago after he came out as gay.
MORE: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/moms-campaign-divided-texas-town-family-rcna42031
This story is well worth the read, imo, but I share it with the caveat that it is heart-breaking.
I am not anti-religion in a general sense, but I am anti the kind of religion that morphs into hate and intolerance and leads someone to do the kinds of things this woman is doing.
My heart goes out to Weston Brown and everyone like him who has been mistreated by their parents due to their sexuality and/or gender identity. Monica Brown does not deserve to have this remarkable young man as her son.
