A “groundbreaking” book billed as an “honest look” at the life and struggles of transgender teens has sparked outrage online over a disturbing description of “sex” with a six-year-old child.
The book titled ‘Beyond Magenta’ has actually been on the shelves since 2014, but gained widespread attention after some disturbing passages were highlighted by the Binary Australia website, which describes itself as seeking to “challenge the aggressive agenda to de-gender” society.
One young adult interviewed for the book describes performing and “loving” oral sex from the age of six. Alarmingly, there is no immediate clarification for young readers that this is illegal and damaging behavior.
From six up, I used to kiss other guys in my neighbourhood, make out with them, and perform oral sex on them. I liked it. I used to love oral. And I touched their you-know-whats. We were really young but that’s what we did.
Yet, ‘Beyond Magenta’ has also found itself on another kind of list. It was number four on the ‘Top Ten Most Challenged Books of 2015’, according to the American Library Association’s ‘State of America’s Libraries’ report. Despite the uproar — or maybe because of it — the book sits at number 22 in Amazon’s ‘Teen & Young Adult Sexuality and Pregnancy’ section.
Kirralie Smith, the directory of Binary Australia told the Daily Caller that “such material has no place in tax-payer funded libraries and should certainly never be promoted to children.”
Some aren’t worried by the book’s content, however. In its review, Publishers Weekly called it “a sorely needed resource” for teens.