Edwards’ vague responses leave Ellard uneasy. Libraries Not Landfills has called on the PDSB to “make public the list of the materials already weeded” and to restore any purged books that have not yet been destroyed to library shelves. And despite all the media attention and ministerial instruction, Edwards’ claim that weeding has been “paused” suggests it could be restarted once the hubbub dies down. “As parents we lack transparency and accountability for the loss of the materials,” says Ellard. “And we have no clarity on who is responsible for the path forward.” As for repairing the damage already done, Ellard figures it could take between four and nine years and $16.2 million to repopulate the PDSB’s school libraries to their pre-purge levels.

Who Thinks Treating Books as Garbage is a Good Idea?

Ascribing the implementation of the PDSB’s plan to “a miscommunication” is obvious legerdemain. In fact, the story of how the book purge came to be provides clear evidence of the dangers posed by handing administrative control of public institutions to anti-racist activists operating under the guise of promoting diversity, inclusion and equity. Make no mistake, this is the same poisonous ideology that has infected universities across North America, imposing race-based hiring, marginalizing conservative-minded professors, cancelling invited speakers with contrary points of view and generally contributing to campuses devoid of intellectual freedom or merit.

The story of how a public school board declared picture books about curious monkeys and hungry caterpillars unfit for circulation took shape three years ago when the PDSB, Canada’s second-largest school board comprising the racially-diverse Toronto suburbs of Mississauga and Brampton, was riven by accusations of racism. A black parents’ group, Advocacy Peel, also known as Peel African Youth Advocacy, complained loudly that their children were underperforming at school due to board-wide systemic discrimination (while ignoring obvious socio-economic factors such as rates of single-parenthood and family income).

Seeking to calm the waters, Lecce dutifully ordered an investigation. Based on recommendations of the Review of the Peel District School Board, in March 2020 the province provided the PDSB with 27 directives to correct the alleged problems. Most were focused on governance issues and hiring practices, but Directive #18 called for “a comprehensive diversity audit of schools – including naming, mascots, libraries and classrooms…to ensure that they are inclusive and culturally responsive.”

The province, perhaps naïvely, told the board to check its libraries; anti-racist zealots at the board took this as permission to impose their own political agenda on the entire library system. From the slender thread of Directive #18, it appears PDSB bureaucrats concocted the entire weeding plan. The document clandestinely handed to Ellard does not list an author other than “Library Support Services,” but Ellard’s group has also released an internal memo from Bernadette Smith, the PDSB’s Superintendent of Innovation and Research, promoting the weeding plan and reminding board employees to “follow the guidance from the training sessions” and to dispose of all culled library materials “in a sustainable manner.”

The eagerness with which the PDSB’s administrators embraced the idea of destroying books in the name of diversity appears consistent with the board’s growing reputation for intolerance in other areas. The National Post, for example, recently published a front-page investigation into rampant anti-Semitism at the PDSB following the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel. As the Post reported after interviewing numerous teachers at the board, “Some principals are using social media tools like X and Facebook to broadcast hateful content toward Israel and Jews on feeds that are displayed in school foyers and over the internal public address system.” Several Jewish teachers told the Post that, given this atmosphere, they feared for their safety.

The Rot Spreads

Beyond publicly-funded education institutions such as universities and school boards, the rejection of pluralism and freedom of thought is apparently infecting other components of the literary world as well. For example, well-known Canadian children’s book publisher Tundra Book Group states on its website that it is “currently only accepting manuscript and art submissions by creators from underrepresented communities. If you identify as Black, Indigenous or as a person of color, [sic] LGBTSQI2S+, having a disability or have ever had refugee status, we want to hear from you!” Tundra’s commitment to diversity appears to exclude a vast array of established Canadian children’s authors and illustrators, as well as most of this country’s young readers.

Other major children’s publishers, including KidsCan and Second Story, have similar submission policies. And in 2021, Annick Press issued a call for applications for a mentorship program for writers “whose perspectives have historically been excluded from children’s publishing. This includes but is not limited to LGBTQ2SIA+ writers, Black writers, Indigenous writers, writers of color, [sic] writers living with disabilities, and anyone living at the intersections of these identities.”

Curiously, all these publishing houses remained silent throughout the PDSB scandal. But when news broke around the same time that the Waterloo Catholic District School Board in southwestern Ontario was screening books in a reading contest to limit access by young students to new books with explicit LGBTQ themes, Annick and two other children’s publishers released a joint statement declaring, “It is especially critical that all kids, including those who are 2SLGBTQIA+ and from other underrepresented communities, have access to stories that celebrate the rich and diverse experiences of the children we serve across the country.” It appears book publishers are more interested in selling new books with a particular ideological bent than they are in defending the foundational issue of the freedom to read any book.

A Delightful Diversity of Children’s Literature in Canada

The argument that publishers need to impose artificial discriminatory policies to diversify their lists, or that school library collections need to be culled to ensure young readers have a “rich and diverse” reading experience, is itself a falsehood. It is belied by the fact that Canada has for decades been well-supplied with a broad range of stories and perspectives aimed at children. There is no diversity problem in Canada’s school libraries or the publishing world in need of fixing.