“Geography Club,” a book about gay teens, has been removed from library shelves of a school district in Tacoma, Washington. Superintendent Patti Banks claims the “romanticized” portrayal of a teen meeting a stranger at night in a park after meeting the person in an Internet chat room, and not the gay theme of the book (or other horrible things like it’s promotion of tolerance), is the reason the book has been banned.

In the 2003 book, a teenager thinks he’s the only gay student in his high school until he learns that his online, gay chat room buddy is a popular athlete at his school. The teen meets others, and they form the school Geography Club, thinking the name will be so boring no one else will join.

Banks had “Geography Club” withdrawn from Curtis Junior and Senior high school libraries after a couple with children in both schools filed a complaint Oct. 21 asking the district to remove the book.

They wrote that reading the book could result in a “casual and loose approach to sex,” encourage use of Internet porn and the physical meeting of people through chat rooms.

Geography Club