School District Keeps Explicit Book in School, Parents Outraged

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PRAIRIE DU SAC, Wis. (ChurchMilitant.com) - Concerned parents are pleading with a Wisconsin school district to yank a sexually explicit book for teens. The principal is refusing.

Concerned over sexually explicit descriptions, coarse language and anti-Christian messages, parents of children in the Sauk Prairie school district are pleading with the school to remove Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian from the required reading list for incoming freshmen.

In an email to Church Militant, Laura Breunig, a concerned member of the community, describes how another parent, Lisa Enerson, was treated after complaining to the school's principal, Chad Harnisch.

Enerson, complaining about the "vulgar" book — which includes masturbation, homosexuality, eating disorders, crime and violence, all of which are presented as normal in the book — requested that it be banned. Harnisch refused, threatening Enerson that if she approached the school board, "she would be made a laughing stock as the opposition would show up in force with the media and she would lose publicly."

When Enerson told Harnisch she would pray for him, he replied, "I'd expect you people like you to say something like that to me."

During the school board meetings, Breunig claims the librarian and middle school English teacher were not entirely honest about the fact that the seventh graders would be getting a copy of the book. While parents were discussing whether the book was appropriate for ninth graders, the seventh-grade English teacher was giving her students access to the book.

Enerson also says there is a climate of fear and intimidation in the school:

There were three to four public school employees and quite a few community members that contacted me confidentially to show support but would not publicly make a statement, be on my panel, write letters to [school board] or make phone calls for fear of repercussions as listed: loss of job, fear of offending others they work with, being mistreated at school, their children being [affected] in the school (in terms of grades and on the sports field). etc.

In one incident, a teacher at the school publicly praised a child for speaking in defense of the book in front of the student who opted out of the lesson. Both Enerson and Breunig have been shunned at the school and in the community for their efforts.

[T]here was no discussion with any student. They were told to take the book home over Christmas/winter break, and there would be an essay test once class resumed. The essay was on why the student thought the book should or should not be banned, and they were required to list specific references from the book to support their argument.

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