The mother of a 3-year-old who attends Fannin County Headstart is upset that her daughter was able to choose a book to take home that promotes homosexuality and is also a political satire.
The young girl chose the book entitled “A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo” when her class was taken through the available free books that were donated to Headstart from The Craddock Center.
That night, Anita Postell was reading the book to her 3-year-old, 4-year-old and 6-year-old before bed. She realized the book was about homosexuality and the politics around homosexuality after two boy bunnies had had “a good hop,” and in fact “the best hop” and wanted to get married.
Postell immediately stopped reading the book. She said, “Trying to explain to my kids why I wouldn’t finish reading the book, that was real fun. Of course a 3-year-old will pick out a book with a cute bunny on the cover.”
The book goes on to compare homosexuality to eating a sandwich backwards or reading a book from the end to the beginning. The animals in the book also work together to vote out the Stink Bug President who they say is preventing same-sex marriage.
Postell said,
“I just don’t want anybody else, especially a 3-year-old, getting anything like this. It’s our job as parents to teach them the ways of things, and I should not have to worry about my kids going to school and being taught something different than what they’re taught at home.”
The mother called the Fannin County School System to warn them to be on the look out for the book because they also receive donated books. Deputy Superintendent Betsy Hyde confirmed she spoke with Postell and that they followed up with the Principals and the Media Specialists to see if the book had made it into any of the schools. School system officials confirmed the book was not in any library or school. She said, in general, whenever there is a complaint or a controversy about a book a media committee meets to review and discuss the book to determine what action would be taken.
Hyde commented to Postell and to The News Observer that the book appeared to be a parody of the children’s book that Charlotte and Karen Pence wrote and illustrated titled, “Marlon Bundo’s Day in the Life of the Vice President.”
A search online reveals the parody book was the second-most complained-about last year, according to the Washington Post and Amazon reviews of the Pence’s book reveal the two books are often confused for each other.
As far as the book coming from The Craddock Center, Postell said, “I understand they get their books donated but they need to read them before hand.”
Programs Director Connie Chancey said many books are donated to their organization and that volunteers open the books to stick stickers in the book saying they are from the center before the books are donated.
Chancey said The Craddock Center has benefited the community for 19 years and that they only want to “spread happy and hope to all the children and would never want to offend anyone.” She said the book has been pulled from the shelves of their library and that the organization will discuss the need for revising the practices or procedures regarding reviewing the books that come into their possession.
Hyde said, “The Craddock Center does lots of good things for the community, the school system and families in the area. It’s possible this book could have been confused for the other book.”
Lynn Doss who sits on the Board of Directors for The Craddock Center said the situation has been resolved. She said the center gets donations from numerous places like Scholastic Books and a box of books may have one copy of a book or 30 copies. “They aren’t indexed as to who was gracious enough to send the book,” she said.
Doss said she hadn’t seen the book in question until this situation arose. When asked about the books being reviewed in the future, she said, “Books come as to age-appropriate grade level, they don’t necessarily come as to age-appropriate content level. Which, unfortunately we live in a society that that is the case.
“We’ll make every endeavor, as we have in the past, to ensure the books that are handed to children are new, clean, have not been tampered with and are age-appropriate on all levels.”