Ray Hartmann
February 11, 2023
One of the most inspiring baseball stories ever told might not be suitable for Florida public school libraries under the rule of Gov. Ron DeSantis.
The book, “Roberto Clemente: Pride of the Pittsburgh Pirates,” is among the more than 1 million titles that “have been covered or stored and paused for student use” in Florida, NBC News reported. The freeze follows the Florida “Stop W.O.K.E. Act” that DeSantis signed in 2022.
The book about Clemente’s life by Jonah Winter and Raul Colon is not alone. Other books about Latino figures, such as U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor and the late Afro-Cuban salsa single Celia Cruz, have the same frozen status, NBC reported.
Clemente, an Afro-Puerto Rican widely regarded as among the top tier of all-time baseball greats, died at the age of 38 in 1972, when his plane crashed off the coast of Puerto Rico as he was delivering relief supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua.
Clemente was among the greatest Latino heroes in history, not only as an athlete but as a humanitarian and outspoken foe of injustice.
“Clemente often denounced racism and discrimination in his native Spanish language, and he spoke publicly about his experiences as a Black Latino climbing the baseball ranks during the civil rights movement,” NBC News noted. “He even spoke about political and social issues alongside Martin Luther King Jr.”
Apparently, that might not comport with what children in Florida are allowed to learn now. Here’s how NBC described that:
“School officials are in the process of determining if such books comply with state laws and can be included in school libraries.
“DeSantis signed laws last year that require schools to rely on certified media specialists to approve which books can be integrated into classrooms. Guidance on how that would be implemented was provided to schools in December.
Books must align with state standards such as not teach K-3 students about gender identity and sexual orientation; not teach critical race theory, which examines systemic racism in American society, in public grade schools; and not include references to pornography and discrimination, according to the school district.”
Ray Hartmann is a St. Louis-based journalist with nearly 50 years experience as a publisher, TV show panelist, radio host, daily newspaper reporter and columnist. He founded St. Louis alt weekly, The Riverfront Times, at the age of 24.
“School officials are in the process of determining if such books comply with state laws and can be included in school libraries.
“DeSantis signed laws last year that require schools to rely on certified media specialists to approve which books can be integrated into classrooms. Guidance on how that would be implemented was provided to schools in December.
Books must align with state standards such as not teach K-3 students about gender identity and sexual orientation; not teach critical race theory, which examines systemic racism in American society, in public grade schools; and not include references to pornography and discrimination, according to the school district.”
Ray Hartmann is a St. Louis-based journalist with nearly 50 years experience as a publisher, TV show panelist, radio host, daily newspaper reporter and columnist. He founded St. Louis alt weekly, The Riverfront Times, at the age of 24.
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