Western Standard - May 31, 2022


Sask children’s libraries defend transgender books for young children.

Topics
gender identity books for children
Mentioned
Jeff Barber Llama Glararama Edward Felix Cassandra Jules Corrigan Simon James Green Christina Gonzalez John Brennan Kirsten Bridgson Gene Willis Hassan Amiri Meet Ari Library Freddy Larry Uncle
CORY'S RANT： Anti-enterprise ideology is killing essential projects Triggered： Handgun law is a vanity project for Trudeau.

Episode Stats


Length

5 minutes

Words per minute

165.82

Word count

952

Sentence count

48

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Saskatoon's Children's Library lobby is filled with books about gender identity targeted at young children. There's They, She, He, They, They and Me, Free to Be by Maya Cristina Gonzalez and The Name I Call Myself by Hassan Amir, about a biological boy who goes on a gender identity journey from age 6 to becoming a teenager.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.160 Saskatchewan's children's libraries defend transgender books for young children.
00:00:05.680 The Regina Children's Library lobby is filled with books about gender identity targeted at young children.
00:00:12.520 There's They, She, He, Me, Free to Be by Maya Cristina Gonzalez,
00:00:17.380 giving young children an understanding of different pronouns used in gender diversity.
00:00:22.560 Pronouns serve as a familiar starting point for kids and grown-ups to expand ideas about gender
00:00:27.880 and celebrate personal expression with fun imagery that provides a place to meet and play, said the publisher.
00:00:36.200 Then there's the pronoun book, She, He, They, and Me by Cassandra Jules Corrigan
00:00:41.420 that educates young children about gender diversity and proper pronoun etiquette.
00:00:47.160 A fun and beautifully illustrated book that celebrates gender diversity through educating young children on pronouns.
00:00:54.060 The book teaches pronoun etiquette, why it is so important, and how it relates to us.
00:00:59.980 It covers they-them pronouns, trans, non-binary identities, and neo-pronouns with a dedicated section for adults, said the publisher.
00:01:09.180 For children slightly older, there's You Be You, The Kid's Guide to Gender, Sexuality, and Family by Jonathan Brantman.
00:01:17.060 That explains gender identity, sexual orientation, and family diversity to 7 to 11-year-olds.
00:01:24.620 This is an illustrated children's book for ages 7 to 11 that makes gender identity, sexual orientation, and family diversity an easy way to explain to children.
00:01:35.200 Throughout the book, kids learn that there are many kinds of people in the world and that diversity is something to be celebrated, says Amazon.
00:01:43.600 It covers gender, romantic orientation, discrimination, intersectionality, privilege, and how to stand up for what's right.
00:01:51.340 With charming illustrations, clear explanations, and short sections that can be dipped in and out of,
00:01:58.160 this book helps children think about how to create a kinder, more tolerant world.
00:02:03.880 There's Llama Glararama by Simon James Green about a llama who discovers who he really is in the world.
00:02:10.600 When he stumbles upon the Llama Glararama, a carnival of music and dancing,
00:02:15.600 Larry, who marches to the beat of his own drum, finally finds the courage to be who he really wants to be, said the publisher.
00:02:23.300 If you're looking for a similar book to Llama Glararama, look no further than Frocodile by Gene Willis,
00:02:29.300 about a male crocodile who likes to wear dresses and how he tells his father.
00:02:33.400 Cliff the Crocodile wants to wear a dress.
00:02:35.200 When the hyenas laugh at Cliff, he pretends he's dressing up for a play, but no play exists.
00:02:41.340 Luckily, his friend Freddy comes to the rescue and creates a show for Cliff to star in.
00:02:45.640 But what will his dad say when he sees him, says the publisher.
00:02:49.680 Felix likes to wear skirts, and his parents help him understand himself in Felix's New Skirt by Kirsten Bridgson.
00:02:57.700 Felix likes to wear skirts. He thinks they're fun, plus he likes the way his legs move in them.
00:03:01.940 His family doesn't mind, but that's not the case for Felix's classmates.
00:03:06.280 Their merciless teasing makes him want to give up school for good.
00:03:09.500 Can Felix's parents come up with a way to validate Felix's expression, said the publisher.
00:03:16.540 Hassan Amir's book, The Name I Call Myself, is about a biological boy who goes on a gender identity journey from age six
00:03:24.240 to becoming a teenager with a father who disapproves of his son playing with dolls and wanting to wear dresses.
00:03:30.300 A sweet and moving picture book depicting Ari's gender journey from childhood to adolescence
00:03:35.560 in order to discover who they really are.
00:03:38.540 Meet Ari, a young person who doesn't like to be called by their birth name, Edward, said the publisher.
00:03:43.640 Throughout this beautiful and engaging picture book, we watch Ari grow up before our very eyes
00:03:48.180 as they navigate the ins and outs of their gender identity.
00:03:51.760 We see how, as a child, they prefer dolls and princess movies and want to grow out their hair,
00:03:57.040 though their father insists on cutting it short because that's what a boy looks like.
00:04:02.540 At 10, they play hockey but wish they could try on their mother's dresses.
00:04:07.140 At 15, they shave their body, hoping to have smooth skin like the girls.
00:04:11.160 At 16, they want to run away, especially from their father who insists,
00:04:15.000 you are a boy so you have to act like one. 0.59
00:04:17.980 Who will Ari become? 1.00
00:04:19.340 Moving from age 6 to adolescence, the name I call myself touchingly depicts
00:04:24.100 Edward's tender, solitary gender journey to Ari, a new life distinguished and made.
00:04:30.020 These are just a few examples of gender identity books available through the
00:04:33.800 Regina Children's Library and the Saskatchewan Information and Library Services Consortium.
00:04:39.040 There are a few different displays in our children's area at the moment,
00:04:42.020 and yes, one of them is a display on children's books for Pride Month,
00:04:45.980 said the library director and CEO, Jeff Barber, to the Western Standard.
00:04:50.980 He was asked how popular the books were.
00:04:53.060 In an answer to your question, yes, Auntie, Uncle, and Frocodile are fairly popular books in our collection.
00:04:58.380 The pronoun book is not currently on the display because it has been checked out, said Barber.
00:05:03.360 Barber clarified how the library picks what children's books it carries
00:05:08.300 and leaves it to parental discretion on what books are appropriate for each child.
00:05:12.460 The Regina Public Library acquires materials based on requests, popular or trending subject matter,
00:05:18.740 and to maintain a broadly-based browsing collection for our customers.
00:05:22.480 In the case of children's materials, Regina Public Library encourages and understands
00:05:26.940 that parents make choices about their children's reading.
00:05:30.500 Whether or not any of these books are appropriate for their children
00:05:33.100 is entirely at the discretion of individual parents, said Barber.
00:05:37.940 I'm Christopher Olkorn reporting for the Western Standard.
00:05:42.460 I'm Christopher Olkorn reporting for the Western Standard.