In this week's special edition of Endnotes, we take a look at what happened after Gender Queer (Oni, 2019) by Maia Kobabe was banned. According to the ALA, Kobabe's graphic memoir was the most challenged book of 2023.
Here's how the team behind Gender Queer fought censorship and book banning:
Maia Kobabe, Author
“These challenges aren’t happening in a vacuum. The attempts to erase queer and trans stories are part of the same movement that seeks to ban trans healthcare, ban trans athletes, and ban trans people from using restrooms. Even as challenges have boosted my career, I’ve watched in frustration and anger as trans people are increasingly forced to battle for our right to simply exist in public.”
Emily Mitchell, Agent, Wernick & Pratt
“My role has mostly been support and traffic control: maintaining communication among Maia, eir publisher, the CBLDF, and others involved in defending books and fighting censorship. My email is the contact on Maia’s website, and I’ve received truly toxic messages. My job is to help Maia stay focused on eir work and ignore the ugliness as much as possible.”
Jeff Trexler, Interim Director, Comic Book Legal Defense Fund
“The CBLDF has been responding to Gender Queer challenges since
we learned it was under attack. In 2022, we became more directly involved when I became counsel for Maia, to defend against a court petition to have the book declared obscene in Virginia. There have been multiple threats to arrest teachers, librarians, and others for distributing Gender Queer—so far we’ve been able to persuade
law enforcement not to act on them.”
Hunter Gorinson, President and Publisher, Oni Press
“Oni Press, along with our parent company, Polarity, has been emphatically involved in defending Gender Queer once challenges started to occur with more regularity, and both have contributed a substantial sum to defending Maia’s work. We view it as our responsibility as publishers to safeguard what has become a beloved and definitive work of American nonfiction.”
