In 1985, a national Christian conservative group worked to create a new restriction on children accessing controversial content. One of their targets: Judy Blume.
Cal Thomas, a leader of Moral Majority, an American political organization associated with the Christian right and the GOP, endorsed the decision on his radio show. He described Blume’s coming-of-age books as “junk reading” that were on focused on “masturbation, menstruation, divorce.” He lamented that “even with these restrictions, [Judy Blume’s books] enjoy far more exposure than, let us say, the Bible, or a book about the benefits of chastity and saving oneself until marriage.”
Blume’s most popular book, “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret,” is about an 11-year-old girl dealing with universal tween issues of navigating friendships, watching your body change, and deciding what and whom to believe in. The book is written in a first-person narrative, with Margaret confiding in readers while exploring different religions, untangling family ties and figuring out sexual attraction, as she impatiently waits for her period.
The film adaptation of “Margaret,” in theaters April 28, comes at a time when the country is seeing one of the most intense increases in book bans. Librarian groups hope the movie will draw attention to Blume’s five-decade-long fight and rally support against book bans.
Book challenges in 2022 doubled from the previous year, the American Library Association said this week as it released its list of the 13 most-challenged books. More book bans were attempted last year than in any since the group began compiling data more than 20 years ago, the ALA said.
“Margaret” was banned several times through the 1980s, and landed on the ALA’s list of the 100 most-banned books in the 1990s and the 2000s. The bans were imposed because the book was regarded as “sexually offensive, profane, and immoral,” and “built around sex and anti-Christian behaviors,” according to Robert Doyle’s “Banned Books: Defending Our Freedom to Read.”
“The early ’80s was the last time we had a surge of banned books as we have today,” said Emily Knox, an associate professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the author of “Book Banning in 21st-Century America.” “That the movie is being released at this time will certainly shine a spotlight on books that are being banned in the tradition of Judy Blume, books that make some people uncomfortable, even though they shouldn’t.”
Blume recently told the BBC that people must fight the bans, “because even if they don’t let them read books, their bodies are still going to change and their feelings about their bodies are going to change. And you can’t control that. They have to be able to read, to question.”
Both today and in the past, Knox said, groups advocating bans say they are to protect kids, “but it’s actually to protect adults from having to talk to kids about things they would rather not talk about.”
In his 1985 radio broadcast, Thomas went a step further than simply disparaging Blume’s books — he criticized the author’s personal life.
“I would offer antidotes to the poison dished out by the twice-married and currently living with a man to whom she is not married Judy Blume, whose values she wants to make our children’s values,” he said.
Chris Finan, executive director of the National Coalition Against Censorship, has known Blume since the 1980s when her books started feeling the national heat. (Blume has been a part of the NCAC for decades.)
“There was a surge of book bans in the 1980s when Ronald Reagan was in the office, and there was no question that the pressure was from conservative religious groups like Moral Majority,” Finan recalled.
“That they would look at her marital status ... or imply that she was a loose woman, that’s the kind of rhetoric you heard at that time,” he said. “Today the rhetoric is far more political.”
Finan added that today the pressure is not only on books that featured some element of sex but also on young-adult books that have themes relating to LGBTQ people and people of color. He added that a common theme from the 1980s to today is the accusation that libraries are pushing books that are harmful to children.
“Then they saw Judy as someone who was introducing children to sex, and now they think that books about LGBT people are going to make children gay,” Finan said.
In a 1981 interview with the Christian Science Monitor, Blume asked why it took a decade for “Margaret” to face bans. “She charges that the attacks are coming from Moral Majority and other conservative groups,” the Monitor reported.
Then, Moral Majority denied that it opposed Blume’s books or had a national campaign against her or anyone else’s books. “They’re trying to use us to sell more of their books,” Thomas told the Monitor.
There are concerns about how well “Margaret” has held up in modern times. However, throughout the publicity and launch of the upcoming movie, Blume has focused attention and support on authors dealing with book bans today.
“Judy continues to be a symbol for YA authors. Her story is very encouraging for authors facing bans,” Finan said. “She highlights the importance of fighting for their power and showing the way for how that battle will be won.”