A southern Manitoba principal is suing a parent who sought to have books removed from school libraries, saying the woman wrote defamatory social media posts insinuating the principal promoted the dissemination of child pornography.
Carman Collegiate principal Mary Reimer says Raelyn Fox has continued to target the Prairie Rose School Division and her high school years after the woman — who had a child enrolled at the school in 2023 — first brought up allegations its library made sexually explicit materials available for children, according to an affidavit filed at the Court of King’s Bench.
Reimer is seeking damages as well as an injunction barring Fox from publishing statements implying she encouraged for pornographic materials to be made available to students, or that she groomed children and promoted sexual exploitation or child pornography.
“The implications of … comments made by Ms. Fox and by other users on her Facebook page, that I have been encouraging, tolerating or otherwise taking part in the sexual abuse of children are irreparably harmful,” Reimer said in an affidavit.
Fox was behind a 2023 petition calling on the Prairie Rose School Division to block books she said were sexually explicit from being made available to minors in school libraries, according to an affidavit the parent filed in late July.
The woman said that, in a series of presentations to the division’s board of trustees, she raised concerns about books like Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake and The Handmaid’s Tale and Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five.
Reimer alleges some of the books Fox presented as being freely available to students at the Carman Collegiate library – including Rupi Kaur’s Milk and Honey, Alice Sebold’s Lucky and Juno Dawson’s This Book is Gay – were either not in circulation or in a section restricted to mature students, and that Fox had been told this was the case.
She said Fox continues to imply in her social media pages those books are widely available at the library.
“I believe that Ms. Fox’s social media posts are causing other Facebook users to escalate in their posts and/or increase the potential for violence,” Reimer said in an August filing.
“I am fearful that Ms. Fox has inflamed such hostility among members of the community that myself or other Prairie Rose School Division staff could be in danger.”
Reimer is also seeking an order to get Fox to delete social media statements she said are defamatory, including a post saying the principal believed “porn should be available to your child whether you find it offensive or not.”
Fox denied in her affidavit her posts were defamatory. She said that while some of the books were not shelved, they still showed up in catalogue records, and that she saw similar content during a visit to the Collegiate’s library.
Fox also denied she referred to LGBTQ themes when she brought up her concerns to the division’s trustees, even if another delegation did bring that issue up.
The Canadian Library Challenges Database — an initiative by Toronto Metropolitan University’s Centre for Free Expression and the Canadian Federation of Library Associations — says calls to remove books at Prairie Rose at the time revolved around 20 titles, including sex-ed books and materials with 2SLGBTQ+ content.
The centre’s director, James Turk, said Canadian libraries have been dealing with a rise in requests to remove books or cancel programs, with groups that describe themselves as being for parents’ rights increasingly targeting schools.
That includes Manitoba’s Concerned Citizens Canada, which the centre says also pushed for books at Prairie Rose to be removed, and Action4Canada, which was behind several recent challenges at the Pembina Trails School Division.
Turk says the groups will often argue schools are violating child pornography laws by making the books available even though there are legal protections for materials serving educational or artistic purposes.
“They have every right to express that concern, and the public library or the school board has an obligation to take that concern seriously,” he said. “I think the overwhelming majority of the time, because they are careful about what gets in their collection, the answer is … ‘We’re keeping it.’”
Fox has targeted other Manitoba school divisions in a series of social media videos.
She has declined to comment on the lawsuit. In a recent video, she thanked people making donations to cover legal costs, saying it helped her “keep standing strong in this fight to protect our kids.”
But Turk added he fears lack of oversight because of cutbacks may lead to some schools taking the quick solution and they might “just make the book disappear.”
“The parent goes away happy. There’s no bad news about it. It never comes to public attention. And that is a terrible way to handle the situation,” he said.
Reimer and the Prairie Rose School Division declined to comment.
