On a March afternoon in 2021, Jonathon Graham’s daughter came home and told him about the book the school librarian read to her second-grade class at Whitwell Elementary.
The librarian had read “Bad Dad” by David Walliams, a children’s chapter book about a son trying to free his father from jail that includes a description of two women getting married.
Upset by what he described as the book’s graphic violence and its depiction of same-sex marriage, Graham contacted the Marion County school’s principal to object to the book and remove his daughter from the library-related arts class. His complaint was one of nine that have been officially filed at Southeast Tennessee school districts in recent years.
“School, in my opinion, is a time of safety for a lot of kids,” Graham said in a phone interview.
He said students should “not have to go and hear a book about some of the issues that very well may be going on at home as well. It ought to be an environment of protection and no judgment and of happiness.”