TWO people have videoed their visits to libraries, including two in the City of Swan, while they search for books they deem inappropriate for children.
In July the couple posted videos on social media of their visits to libraries in Ellenbrook and Bullsbrook.
They have also posted online about visiting libraries in the cities of Armadale and Mandurah.
The man narrating the videos describes himself as anti-mandate, anti-groomer, Christian, nationalist and conservative.
When the couple found a copy of I’m not a girl in the parental resources section of the Bullsbrook library they placed a brochure inside it with the message ‘No child is born in the wrong body’ before placing it back on the shelf.
But the man said he was pretty impressed overall.
“Should have expected as much, semirural, most people out here are hardworking, blue collar families – they’re are not going to stand for a lot of that rubbish,’’ he said.
But then he went to where his wife had found a copy of The Puberty Book which included drawings of male and female genitalia so it too had a brochure placed it in.
While in the Bullsbrook library they recorded the conversation they had with a library staff member.
When approached by the staff member the woman said they were new to the area and asked whether they had any stuff for children aged eight to 12-years-old.
In the Ellenbrook video the narrator said some books were not the worst they had seen but they were inappropriate, exploitative and indoctrinating children.
Echo News alerted the City of Swan to the videos on July 20 and on July 25 City of Swan acting chief executive officer Meriel Pickering said the city had taken action to ensure its libraries remained safe, non-disruptive and welcoming places for everyone.
“Our top priority is always the safety and welfare of our staff and community,’’ she said.
Curtin Extremist Research Network (CERN) co-director Ben Rich said the current discord surrounding trans issues was extremely hostile and toxic.
“But in terms of a security threat I think we have to kind of take a bit of a step back from that as the first and foremost problem to consider here,’’ he said.
Dr Rich said there had been a big push in the use of the groomer discourse, which was very much a moral panic to try and change the terms of trans discussion so that all trans people were characterised as potential predators.
“You point to a number of extremely small outliers as examples you say this is representative and so what that does is if you’re someone, say a normal person, who is not particularly engaged with this your first or primary exposure to questions around trans is all around this – these questions around protecting your children from these potential predators and this is absolutely playing into the hands, it is absolutely what these individuals are trying to do, which is to change the main stream perception of that through these kind of approaches.
“We see that in all sorts of spaces now – again I think it’s a very modern, very post Covid post Trump phenomenon – it’s become more mobilised.”
“It’s always been there it’s always been a part of our society but I think the degree that we see, the intensity to which it is happening, the intensity of the divisions, the intensity of the fragmentation is really where we start talking about growing cultural extremism.”