BANNED BOOKS WEEK: RESOURCES FOR REPORTERS

Banned Books Week takes place October 5-11, 2025. The annual event raises awareness of the harm and the rising trend of book challenges and bans, especially targeting books by and about LGBTQ people and books about race and racism. 

Book bans are part of a sweeping crackdown aimed at censoring and limiting the rising visibility and acceptance of LGBTQ people and youth. 

GLAAD is releasing facts and resources to help reporters cover book bans accurately and include LGBTQ voices in coverage:

• LGBTQ books and books about race and racism dominate the list of most challenged titles as tracked by the American Library Association (ALA). “All Boys Aren’t Blue” by George M. Johnson and “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe remain at the top of most banned titles tracked by ALA.

• The majority of book bans are fueled by extremist pressure groups, not local community demand.
  

• LGBTQ people make up 9.3% of the overall population, up from 3.5% in 2012. One in five GenZ adults, the youngest cohort measured, is out as LGBTQ.
• Book bans remain widely unpopular: 71% of voters, including 75% of Democrats and 70% of Republicans, oppose efforts to have books removed from their local public libraries and believe that librarians do a good job offering books with diverse viewpoints. Gallup found that 70% of U.S. parents of K-12 students are either completely or somewhat satisfied with the education that their oldest child is receiving.
• PEN America recorded 6,870 instances of book bans across 23 states and 87 public school districts during the 2024-25 school year. PEN America is hosting in-person events across the country for Banned Books Week and urges contact to your local elected officials to speak out against censorship.
• GLAAD has updated its toolkit: Banned Books: A Guide for Community Response and Action to include more success stories and strategies from communities fighting back against book bans.“GLAAD created this guide with resources from professional library and free speech advocates. By using the power of storytelling and engaging media, communities can unite with their neighbors, send a powerful signal of welcome and acceptance, and strengthen all communities,” GLAAD President and CEO, and author Sarah Kate Ellis said. “While book bans attempt to curb fundamental freedoms, they are far from the final chapter. Communities who care about each vulnerable reader and a future where all can be free should get the last word.”EveryLibrary’s Fight for the First is a key resource in the local success stories detailed in GLAAD’s toolkit for communities.
  
• EveryLibrary also has a simple tool to help supporters craft and send messages in the media, including a Letter to the Editor in your local news outlets.
• GLAAD’s ALERT Desk is continually tracking anti-LGBTQ incidents in communities nationwide, including the targeting and intimidation of school board members. Read out board members’ first person stories on the importance of representation and safety.
• Out author, actor, and social justice advocate George Takei is this year’s Honorary Chair of Banned Books Week. Learn about Takei’s advocacy for LGBTQ people and Japanese Americans including through his graphic memoirs.
• Banned Books Week concludes with Let Freedom Read Day, October 11th. Supporters are urged to take at least one action to help defend books from censorship and to use their voices for library staff, educators, writers, publishers, and booksellers who make books available. Call a decision-maker, check out or buy a banned book, attend a library board meeting, and sign up to support or donate to a nonprofit working to ensure access to books and protection of vulnerable readers in the Banned Books Week coalition. (GLAAD is a Banned Books Week coalition contributor.)
• Searchable map to Banned Books Weeks events in local communities and virtually.
• EveryLibrary is hosting a weeklong online festival of panel discussions for Banned Books Week to include LGBTQ authors Clay Cane, Katherine Locke, Charlotte Sullivan Wild and Cadwell Turnbull.
• Little Free Library, the American Library Association, and PEN America released a new map to show hotspots for censorship around the country and how Little Free Library owners counter by including more titles in their book houses.
  “This newly updated map empowers communities to protect intellectual freedom, champion diverse voices, and ensure that the joy of reading remains accessible to all,” said Daniel Gumnit, Chief Executive Officer of Little Free Library.