Several employees said they quit their jobs after a manager directed them to remove LGBTQ+ titles from the shelves of a popular independent Florida bookstore.
The Bodacious Bookstore & Cafe in downtown Pensacola reportedly received a complaint recently about obscene content on a gift card. “Recently, we reviewed parts of our inventory after receiving emails from parents – some with photos of sexually graphic and vulgar content – who were surprised to find certain books in our store,” they said in a statement.
Following a review instigated by a meeting with the store’s owner, unnamed former and current employees said interim store manager Beth O’Connor directed employees to remove over 60 titles from the store.
Employees told roughly half of the titles removed from the shelves contained LGBTQ+ content. The titles removed included the Heartstopper series by Alice Oseman, and lesbian tennis icon Billie Jean King’s All In and Elliot Page’s Pageboy memoirs.
A spokesperson for the bookstore, denied there was a purge of LGBTQ+ titles, but instead, a review of titles was done to ensure children are not exposed to titles that might not be age-appropriate.
This bookstore's decision reminds me the unacceptable Russian anti-gay propaganda law with the same shaming purpose "to protect" children from "non traditional sexual values". No excuse!!
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