Idaho House Bill 384, Seeks to Censor and Restrict LGB Visibility, Moves Ahead to House Floor for Vote
By Elise von Gunten
Idaho's House Bill 384 (H.B. 384.), which would ban any content containing homosexuals from being openly available in schools and libraries statewide, had its second reading at a two-hour public hearing in the state's capital of Boise on Monday, January 15th, 2024, where the House State Affairs Committee voted along party lines to send it to the House floor with a recommendation to pass it. The bill, which is similar to last year's House Bill 314 (H.B. 314), ultimately vetoed by the governor, purports to seek to prevent the dissemination of materials that are sexually explicit or "harmful to minors" to individuals under the age of 18 and includes content containing homosexual individuals and same-sex couples on its list, alongside the likes of "sado-masochistic sexual abuse" among other explicit topics, regardless of whether the content containing LGB individuals and couples is sexual in nature or not.
H.B. 384, initially introduced on January 10th, 2024, would amend Title 18 Chapter 15 of the state statutes — the section of the Idaho Criminal Code pursuant to "Children and Vulnerable Adults". The bill includes two sections. The first seeks to amend section 18-1514 of the Idaho Code, Obscene Materials Definitions. The second proposes the creation of section 18-1517B, which prohibits the availability and dissemination of sexually explicit materials defined in section 18-1514 to minors by schools and public libraries statewide, deeming such content "harmful to minors."
The proposed changes to section 18-1514 in section one of the bill are minimal and consist of grammatical edits, a minor change to the definition of masturbation, and the addition of a defined designation of the term "school."
The changes to section 18-1514 introduced in H.B. 384 notably do not contain any changes to the definition of sexual conduct (18-1514:3), which includes the blanket existence of homosexuality in addition to the explicitly sexual acts of "masturbation," "sexual intercourse," and "physical contact with a person's clothed or unclothed genitals, pubic area, buttocks or, if such person be a female, the breast."
Section two of H.B. 384, which proposes the addition of Section 18-1517B — "Children's School and Library Protection Act" — to the Idaho Code, seeks to prevent the dissemination of "Obscene Materials" defined in section 18-1514 of the Idaho Code with the changes presented in section one of the bill. The act designates content containing material described in the amended section 18-1514 as harmful to minors and requires schools and public libraries in the state to remove any such content from public visibility. It also prohibits granting minors access to content designated in the bill without the physical presence of a parent or legal guardian.
The act allows minors, parents, and legal guardians to bring action against any school or library that exposes minors to any of the content outlined in the bill, which may include damages up to $250. The act also allows a county prosecuting attorney or the state's attorney general to bring injunctive relief against any school or library that violates section two of the act deemed substantial to prevent further violation.
The restricted content includes any form of media — printed, digital, written, verbal, visual, or performative, — containing matters of "sexual excitement, sexual conduct, or sado-masochistic abuse and that, taken as a whole, is harmful to minors; or any other material harmful to minors."
The long-standing definition of "sexual conduct" in section 18-1514 of the Idaho Code, which designates homosexuality as inherently sexually explicit, remaining unchanged in the proposed amendments in section one of the bill, means that H.B. 384 includes media with any form of LGB representation as restricted content designating it as harmful to minors.
As a result, the passage of H.B. 384, as it currently stands, would cause any content, including content of a non-sexual nature, containing same-sex individuals or couples, to be removed from public visibility and open access, and would ban anyone under the age of 18 from accessing content with any form of LGB representation without the physical presence of a parent or legal guardian at schools and public libraries throughout the state.
While last year's veto of H.B. 314 by Idaho's governor following legislative passage may indicate H.B. 384's fate as the bill moves to the House floor, that is unlikely.
Idaho Governor Brad Little vetoed the 2023 version of this effort, citing H.B. 314's vague language and, in particular, the hefty $2,500 damages proposed, reasoning that these aspects of the bill would cause unintended consequences and place undue financial burden on the state's public libraries writing in his decision "Allowing any parent, regardless of intention, to collect $2,500 in automatic fines creates a library bounty system that will only increase the costs local libraries incur, particularly rural libraries." Both concerns leading to Little's rejection of the bill last year have been addressed in H.B. 384, with this year's bill including much more detailed language and a significant reduction in the proposed damages to $250, giving H.B. 384 a much better chance of being codified as it moves to the floor.
*LGBA USA/LGB Voices objects to H.B. 384's designation of LGB representation as harmful to minors and inherently sexual/explicit and opposes the restriction of content with LGB individuals and couples that is not sexual in nature, or that would not be restricted/censored if the content did not contain LGB individuals and/or couples.