Lawsuit Filed Against Florida for Trying to Keep Gay Porn Out of Schools

Mdisk / shutterstock.com
Mdisk / shutterstock.com

In May of 2023, Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL) signed a bill into law that banned sexually explicit or pornographic materials from school libraries. The law went into effect on July 1, 2023. More than a year later, a coalition of publishers and authors are suing Florida on the grounds that protecting kids from gay porn is somehow a violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

The plaintiffs in the case include Simon and Schuster, Penguin Random House, MacMillan Publishing Group, and Hachette Book Group, as well as several porn authors whose books have been pulled from the shelves in Florida school libraries. They argue that the Florida law prevents them from distributing “constitutionally protected” works. They also claim that the law is too vague in its description of “sexual conduct” and pornography.

Despite the claims of the plaintiffs, their lawsuit doesn’t name any books that have been impacted by the law. The titles are probably too embarrassing to read in open court.

Parents and conservatives in Florida began objecting to the situation in school libraries when they first learned just how much sexually explicit porn was on the shelves. Some of the materials included comic books with graphic depictions of weird gay sex stuff. DeSantis advocated for House Bill 1069, the legislature passed it, and the governor signed it into law.

Parents should not be too worried about the lawsuit at this point. The courts have generally been favorable to limiting children’s access to lewd materials. The plaintiffs’ argument that the law is vague is also unlikely to hold up. To paraphrase one of the most hilarious landmark Supreme Court rulings of all time, no one can come up with a concrete definition of what pornography is—but we all know it when we see it.