Brevard County School District added Sasaki and Miyano Volume 1 to the list of banned books during its board meeting earlier this week. Any parent with a child enrolled in a Florida school district can challenge an unlimited number of books that they find inappropriate. This number is limited to one title per month for Florida residents without children in public schools.
Brevard Public Schools Board Chair, Megan Wright, stated that she would not be voting to keep Sasaki and Miyano, a Boys’ Love manga by Sho Harusono, in middle schools because of its depictions of an “inappropriate relationship” and unfamiliar reading mechanic:
“This book is… it focuses on nothing other than a relationship that’s inappropriate. You start the book, you read it backward… I mean literally, when you start reading a book, which we’ve been teaching our kids since day one, you start from the beginning and you read from left to right. Bottom to top. Not that book, you don’t. So it’s just, to me, I’m going “This is not the highest and best book that we can offer our kids and this is Volume 1 so I’m not sure where this goes because the entire book is focused on a romantic relationship. So I’m like, if this is Volume 1, where does the next one go? So that’s why I won’t be supporting the committee’s recommendation of keeping it. Just letting you know.“
Prior to the Board meeting, the Book Review Committee met and recommended that the manga be kept in the libraries. Her fellow member of the Board, Kayte Campbell, who voted against removal, tried to explain why the book is read “backward” and why it doesn’t fall under “instructional material” on gender and sexuality that Florida laws ban:
“I.. since we’re discussing, I’m not going to defend this book because I didn’t like it. I thought it was kinda stupid. I don’t think there’s a problem with it being backwards because it’s Japanese and it was [translated], you took the Japanese book and inserted English text. But I can agree with the recommendation of the Committee because it doesn’t violate the Statute and I was looking for it but it didn’t.“
Campbell, who represents District 5, and Jennifer Jenkins, who represents District 3 and who shared the news of the ban on her Twitter/X profile, voted to keep the book, while the remaining three members (Wright, Gene Trent, and Matt Susin) voted for removal, even after a discussion point about legality was raised. “I am not comfortable removing a book because we don’t understand why it is being read in an opposite direction,” said Jenkins. Watch the full discussion below:
In addition to Sasaki and Miyano, People Kill People by Ellen Hopkins (graphic depictions of violence) and Damsel by Elana K. Arnold, were also put up for vote and removed. The Book Review Committee voted that these two titles should be removed.
In 2023, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed the Let Kids Be Kids bill package (HB 1069), which restricts sexual education and mentions of sexual orientation and gender identity in classes from Pre-K to 8th grade. The law claims to “protect students from having to declare their pronouns in school” and “ensures that Florida’s bathrooms, changing rooms, and locker rooms are safe places for women.” The law also allows parents and citizens to petition to have classroom books and instructional materials removed. School districts are responsible for providing resolutions. Earlier this year, DeSantis signed a new bill limiting this right for individuals without children who are enrolled in the school district. Florida is the second state with the highest number of book bans in the United States, following only behind Texas.
Update: Jennifer Jenkins also shared the official complaint, which includes reasonings such as “inappropriate content” and offers Chainsaw Man as an alternative.
Sasaki and Miyano Manga
The Sasaki and Miyano manga has been serialized on pixiv Comic platform since 2016. Yen Press licensed it in English and gave it a Teen rating. The licensor describes the plot as:
It all started like a typical old-school boys’ love plotline—bad-boy senior meets adorably awkward underclassman, one of them falls in love, and so on and so forth. But although Miyano is a self-proclaimed boys’ love expert, he hasn’t quite realized…he’s in one himself. Which means it’s up to Sasaki to make sure their story has a happily ever after…!
The Sasaki and Miyano manga received a successful TV anime adaptation and a movie, which are currently streaming on Crunchyroll. The original manga and the adaptation do not contain sexually explicit content.
©2022 Shou Harusono/KADOKAWA/ Sasaki and Miyano Partners
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