The book, which reportedly appeared on a reading list provided to fifth graders, centers around Demetrius, a black, “queer” student whose differences lead him to struggle to fit in among his peers in school.
Author Anastasia Higginbotham’s story includes an “all-accepting” Jesus who tells Demetrius that everyone should be loved. The story also includes a jab at Sen. Mitch McConnell with an illustration of the minority leader and asking whether he should be loved the same.
“That’s Mitch McConnell,” Higginbotham said while reading the book in a YouTube video. “The child wants to know if even Mitch McConnell is invited to love and be loved considering all of the harm he is causing.”
The book also pushes back against religion, depicting Demetrius in a church lamenting that he feels shame there and alluding that Christians hate LGBTQ+ people like Demetrius in Jesus’ name.
The book later pivots to “squad” Reps. Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Ayanna Pressley and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with a relatively subtle reference to the progressive advocates as Demetrius is watching television with family, characterizing them as champions of change.
Higginbotham’s book garnered additional attention when Republican New York congressional candidate and parental rights advocate Maud Maron addressed the issue during a Monday segment of “Fox & Friends First,” telling Fox News’ Griff Jenkins that the issue “runs deeper” than the book itself, and lamented the way teachers are talking to their students in a form of indoctrination that is “harder to follow and track.”
“I’ve personally heard kids start to use words like ‘sex assigned at birth,’” Maron said.
“Nobody assigns you sex at birth. Sex is observed. I knew that I had a baby boy when I gave birth to my son,” she added.
Maron encouraged parents of all political ideologies to take a stand against the “woke” ideologies working their way into public school curriculum out of the best interest of children.
Reporting from FOX News.
