“Buster’s Sugartime” is a children's story set in Vermont where same-sex parents are presented as normal.
-- From "Union school board keeps book on shelves" by Clifton Adcock, Tulsa World Staff Writer 1/28/10
The board voted 3-1 to keep the book . . . The issue went to the board after the parents brought their concerns to the district’s Materials Review Committee in October. The committee voted 6-1 to keep the book on the school’s library shelves.
“Buster’s Sugartime,” by Marc Brown, is a condensed version of a 2005 episode of the “Postcards from Buster” series that airs on PBS in which the anthropomorphic animated rabbit Buster visits Vermont during “Mud Season” to learn about the state and how maple syrup is made.
Most of the “Sugartime” episode is devoted to Buster’s following the children of a same-sex couple as they play, make cookies, visit a dairy, have dinner and make maple syrup. The episode was pulled from many stations after controversy erupted over showing two same-sex couples.
Vermont was the first state to legalize same-sex civil unions in 2000 and legalized same-sex marriage last year.
Don Danz, an attorney, told the school board that rather than from a religious or moral perspective, his problem with the book was that it advocated a practice that is not recognized under Oklahoma’s constitution.
Superintendent Cathy Burden argued on behalf of the district, saying the book meets criteria for literature selection and that the same-sex relationship is not the central theme of the story. She said it is appropriate for children, since the book is about Buster’s adventures with the children in Vermont.
Nancy McDonald, president of the Tulsa chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, said in a statement from Oklahomans for Equality that it is important for the children of same-sex families to know they are accepted.
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