A Utah law surrounding sensitive materials in schools was enforced against the Bible on Thursday.
Gov. Spencer Cox (R-UT) signed HB374 in law back in March 2022, which put it into effect in May of that year. In December, one parent filed a complaint against the Bible in the Davis School District.
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That complaint triggered the requirement that “a local education agency to include parents who are reflective of a school’s community” review the complaint. After six months of deliberation, the agency decided to remove copies of the Bible from elementary and middle schools. It will remain in high schools.
Bill sponsor Rep. Ken Ivory lamented the complaint, accusing the parents of attempting “to poke fun at the very real harm caused by hyper-sexualized materials at schools.”
Ivory has since changed his tune, thanking the district for setting “the floor for the standard by which age-appropriate, sensitive, obscene, and indecent materials must immediately be reviewed” and removing inappropriate materials.
“The [King James Version] Bible is a challenging read for elementary or middle school children on their own,” Ivory said in a statement. “Traditionally, in America, the Bible is best taught, and best understood, in the home, and around the hearth, as a family.”
In this case, the anonymous parent complained the Bible contained instances of “incest, onanism, bestiality, prostitution, genital mutilation, fellatio, dildos, rape, and even infanticide” in a request apparently made sarcastically. The parent thanked the legislature “for making this bad faith process so much easier and way more efficient.”
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“Get this PORN out of our schools!” the request read. “If the books that have been banned so far are any indication for way lesser offenses, this should be a slam dunk.”
Davis School District spokesperson Chris William confirmed to ABC News that there have been more than 60 books called into question since the law’s inception, and 40 remain under consideration.
