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Books do not contain content warnings on their outside covers for things such as explicit, detailed, erotically written sex scenes, graphic rape, pervasive profanity, glorification of suicide or self-harm, sexual assault, descriptive sexual nudity, etc.
It is not reasonable for parents to read every page cover to cover. In fact, it is discriminatory towards those parents who lack the time or ability to read in depth chapter books. Back cover summaries don't divulge the questionable content. Publisher reviews don't divulge the content and they base the category (children, teen, young adult, adult) on character's ages and relatability, not age-appropriate content.
Ultimately, it is the local school board. However, they rely on administration and librarians to make book selections in alignment with policies set forth by the board and in alignment with state education agency policies. These gatekeepers cannot discriminate book selections, policies and guidelines based on ideals in which they disagree; however, they can establish boundaries that outline that which is age appropriate.
Parents can opt-out but at this time there is no way for them to know what they don't know. They can't simply say, I want my child to be opted out of any book with sexually explicit content because books do not have content warnings, they are not classified in the system by such. Simply saying, opt my child out of all YA / Adult is not fair to the child as there are plenty of YA books without questionable content and they are most relatable to older teens.
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