The thing is that LGBT+ content tends to be conflated with sexual content.
We both know that the vast majority of these books aren't banned because they're obscene. They're being banned because people don't want any mention of LGBT+ people or topics, with flimsy excuses.
Seems just as reasonable... So no, not clear at all.
These bans are happening in high school. Be honest with yourself and admit what you already know: High schoolers are horny. Restricting them from books that discuss sexuality in a realistic way, combined with "abstinence only" sex education still common in these places, makes it more likely that their first exposure with sexual media is actual hardcore pornography, and I don't feel like I need to explain to you why that's bad.
You can’t just drop sexually explicit images in a book then cry afoul when parents and taxpayers don’t want it in their public schools. They didn’t allow hustler and playboy and they’re trying to not allow this. They have a pretty consistent standard unlike the groups that advocate for such material to be made available to kids and teens.
How do you expect anyone to take you seriously with such a blatently dishonest comparison?
If I post the blowjob scene from Gender Queer here u/dang is going to ban my account, but you’re free to google it and say whether or not it’s more explicit than a woman baring her breast.
While we’re at it, how un-feminist and objectifying to imply that a woman’s body should be overly sexualized. Isn’t treating men’s and women’s nipples differently how we train kids to objectify women? If anything we need more Playboy in schools to destigmatize a women’s bare body. #FreeTheNipple
If Riley Reid put out a graphic memoir about tearing down taboos in sex and confronting “slut shaming” you wouldn’t advocate for it to be in schools.
If you’re trying to claim I’m making some sort of false analogy or moral equivalency then you should try to answer my original question: what is the limiting principle? Because if it’s as weak as “it’s a memoir that’s about discovering identity” it’s not only a weak argument that few would agree with but it opens the door to a lot of other stuff that you’re already trying to rule out.
What if Playboy helps some boys discover their straight identity? Is that not worth discovering? Some young girls might find Playboy helpful in discovering their lesbian identity. Wrap a story around it and it’s apparently good to go for schools.
It is unclear what harm you believe Gender Queer might cause to teenagers.
The problem you've highlighted with defining what porn is is not a new debate and as you've admitted we'd be here all day - and likely still not agree on a definition. The problem with your definition is that what people find arousing is a pretty wide spectrum and would include things that are not traditionally regarded as porn.
Going back to our thought experiment, at what point would my theoretical graphic memoir of Riley Reid no longer be porn? What would the words to picture ratio have to be? You can make this same argument about Gender Queer; does the inclusion of the illustrations add any significant value to a memoir about someone discovering their identity?
As far as whats appropriate for minors in a public school setting, society decided a while ago that once sexually explicit material is included, there is no countervailing interest. This is a pretty black and white standard that until recently all parties found agreeable. If you are advocating for changing that standard, you'll have to defend why children/teens/minors have more of an interest in seeing illustrations of a minor boy performing oral sex on another minor boy than seeing an adult woman in the nude. Claiming it not being porn can be argued both ways for both.