An official at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) recently called for a book about transgenderism to be pulled from circulation for proliferating dangerous ideas in apparently since-deleted tweets.
Abigal Shrier, the author of the book “Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters,” asked in a Wall Street Journal op-ed published Sunday if the organization was trying to help ban her book.
“Abigail Shrier’s book is a dangerous polemic with a goal of making people not trans,” Strangio tweeted Friday, according to Shrier and others who took screenshots of the social media post. “I think of all the times & ways I was told my transness wasn’t real & the daily toll it takes. We have to fight these ideas which are leading to the criminalization of trans life again.”
Chase Strangio, deputy director for transgender justice at the ACLU, reportedly called Abigail Shrier’s book a “dangerous polemic.” The alleged comments follow Target’s decision to remove the book from its website with some critics arguing that it was “transphobic.” Target reversed its decision to remove the book. (RELATED: Target Reverses Decision To Remove Book Critical Of Transgenderism After Receiving Complaint That It’s ‘Transphobic’)
Here is an ACLU lawyer saying their goal is to stop the circulation of books and ideas…
In case you were wondering how free speech is doing. pic.twitter.com/jIGhCSEAbZ
— Wokal DistΔnce (@wokal_distance) November 13, 2020
You know, I can’t put my finger on it but in certain ways I feel as though the American Civil Liberties Union may have changed. Maybe some subtle differences in worldview? pic.twitter.com/TaFwVXZrPL
— Jesse Singal (@jessesingal) November 14, 2020
“Stopping the circulation of this book and these ideas is 100% a hill I will die on,” Strangio writes in another tweet.
Strangio later told journalist Glenn Greenwald that the tweets were deleted and that they were taken out of context.
Here’s my exchange with @chasestrangio about his now-deleted tweet which appeared to cheer corporate censorship of a new book. I believe his insistence that he didn’t mean that but, as I write, that this is the instinct of even a top ACLU lawyer shows how imperiled this value is: pic.twitter.com/YVhpIFQG9o
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) November 15, 2020
“A generation of girls is at risk,” the Amazon description of Shrier’s book says. “Abigail Shrier’s essential book will help you understand what the trans craze is and how you can inoculate your child against it — or how to retrieve her from this dangerous path.”
Target had initially removed the book in response to a tweet that was limited to view Friday, but was available Monday. The tweet from Nov. 11 said. “I think the trans community deserves a response from @AskTarget@Target as to why they are selling this book about the ‘transgender epidemic sweeping the country’ Trigger Warning: Transphobia.”
The Target customer service account responded by thanking the Twitter user for bringing the book to their attention and said the company removed the book from their “assortment.”
I think the trans community deserves a response from @AskTarget @Target as to why they are selling this book about the “transgender epidemic sweeping the country”
Trigger Warning : Transphobia https://t.co/N1MvMKpqfp pic.twitter.com/68H1xLnjDH— Ten ???? ACAB (@BlueIris04) November 11, 2020
Thank you so much for bringing this to our attention. We have removed this book from our assortment.
— AskTarget (@AskTarget) November 12, 2020
Target later said it reversed its decision in a statement to the Daily Caller.
“Yesterday, we removed a book from Target.com based on feedback we received. We want to offer a broad assortment for our guests and are adding this book back to Target.com. We apologize for any confusion,” the statement said.
Shrier’s book also provoked the condemnation of a transgender professor at the University of California at Berkeley, who urged followers Saturday to steal and burn the book, likening the action to destroying “contaminated crop.” The professor, Grace Lavery, later tweeted that the comments would have not provoked outcry if more people were “more comfortable reading irony.
So first, *please* everyone take English and humanities classes at college. This whole embarrassing mess could have been avoided if people were a little more comfortable reading irony. Twitter over-rewards literalism and punishes ambiguity—but we can overcome that with education.
— Grace Lavery ???? (@graceelavery) November 15, 2020
“Since some ppl have misunderstood my tone, and censorship is an important matter and as a public educator I have a duty to be precise, let me clarify,” Lavery tweeted Saturday. “I do NOT advocate defacing library books. I DO encourage followers to steal Abigail Shrier’s book and burn it on a pyre.”