‘Gender Queer’ author responds to Kennedy’s viral Senate reading

The author of ‘Gender Queer’ responded to Sen. John Kennedy’s (R-La.) viral Senate reading of the memoir this week, which was meant to justify book bans.

The author, Maia Kobabe, told the Washington Post in an interview published Thursday that the conservative senator seemed to conflate the illustrated format with a book meant for children.

“‘Gender Queer’ is a comic, and in full color, but that doesn’t mean it’s for children,” Kobabe said. “I originally wrote it for my parents, and then for older teens who were already asking these questions about themselves. I don’t recommend this book for kids!”

The Louisiana senator read a particularly sexual passage from Kobabe’s book, with the clip shared widely on social media.

“I got a new strap-on harness today. I can’t wait to put it on you. It will fit my favorite dildo perfectly. You are going to look so hot. I can’t wait to have your cock in my life. I’m going to give you the blowjob of your life, then I want you inside of me,” Kennedy said, quoting the book.

Kobabe said it was interesting the senator chose to read the page without showing the images “because the images on that page are not salacious at all — it’s an illustration of me sitting at my job, which was in a library, reading text messages from someone I was dating.” 

Kobabe said that the scene revolved around consent. Its purpose, according to the author, is to show readers “that it’s okay, even mid-sexual experience, to stop and check in with your partner and say, ‘This isn’t working for me, and I need to back off.'”

“It’s a scene about showing the reader I think that’s a message that’s important to share, and it’s not one that I heard often when I was a teenager,” Kobabe said.

Tuesday’s hearing was called in the midst of school board meetings seeing an onslaught of arguments over which books are appropriate for kids, as conservative parents and politicians push for bans on books about sensitive topics like race and sexuality.

“Gender Queer” was the most banned book of the 2021-22 school year, according to free speech group Pen America’s banned book list. 

“The first thing I would say is, please read it before you judge it,” Kobabe told Pen America in an interview.