Julianne Moore ‘in shock’ after Trump bans her children’s book Freckleface Strawberry
Julianne Moore has spoken out about her children’s book Freckleface Strawberry being banned by Trump’s administration. (Marc Piasecki/WireImage/Amazon)
Author Julianne Moore has said she has been left “in shock” after the Trump administration banned her children’s book Freckleface Strawberry.
The book, which was published in 2007, is a semi-autobiographical story about a seven-year-old girl who doesn’t like her red hair and freckles but learns to embrace her uniqueness. Following the first book’s publication, five more sequels were written, plus a 2010 stage musical called Freckleface Strawberry the Musical.
Taking to Instagram on Sunday (16 February), the actress, who played Clarice Starling in Hannibal, wrote: “It is a great shock for me to learn that my first book, Freckleface Strawberry, has been banned by the Trump administration from schools run by the Department of Defense.”
‘I am truly saddened’
She added that she wrote the book for her own children and others to “remind them that we all struggle, but are united by our humanity and our community.”
“I can’t help but wonder what is so controversial about this picture book that cause it to be banned by the US Government. I am truly saddened and never thought I would see this in a country where freedom of speech and expression is a constitutional right,” Moore, who won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role as a woman succumbing to Alzheimer’s disease in 2014’s Still Alice, concluded, before thanking PEN America for bringing the issue to her attention.
PEN America wrote on Instagram that “the removal of these titles is yet another indicator of the new Administration’s flippant and autocratic approach to K-12 education.”
The move to eradicate books that relate to “gender ideology or discriminatory equity ideology topics” is in line with Trump’s executive orders titled Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism, Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government and Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling.
The latter states that “In recent years, however, parents have witnessed schools indoctrinate their children in radical, anti-American ideologies while deliberately blocking parental oversight. Such an environment operates as an echo chamber, in which students are forced to accept these ideologies without question or critical examination.”
Why a book about having freckles has been branded “radical or anti-American” by the Trump administration is unclear. Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s picture book No Truth Without Ruth and transgender activist Nicole Maines’ memoir, Becoming Nicole have also been banned.
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