Controversial Manga Banned in Schools Over Violent Content

Controversial Manga Banned in Schools Over Violent Content

As a longtime fan of manga and anime, I find it disheartening to see titles like “Assassination Classroom” and “Sasaki & Miyano” being removed from school libraries due to baseless complaints. These series have brought joy, entertainment, and even life lessons to millions of readers worldwide.


In Horry County, South Carolina, a school district decided to remove Yusei Matsui’s “Assassination Classroom” from its school libraries on November 15th, following a complaint about the graphic content in the series. The objection was raised by a mother of a ninth-grader who found scenes showing weapons like handguns, rifles, knives, and potions, as well as young female characters wearing lingerie, to be inappropriate.

The school district temporarily removed “Assassination Classroom” from its shelves back in October while they examined the content of the series, and eventually decided to permanently discontinue it according to their regulations, which won’t allow a reconsideration for at least five years. This manga revolves around a group of middle school students who are assigned with assassinating their own homeroom teacher – an alien with incredible powers planning to destroy Earth by the end of the school year. The manga started serializing in the “Jump Comics” imprint of Weekly Shonen Jump in 2012 and ended in 2016. An anime adaptation followed in 2015, airing for 47 episodes. Given that it is a shonen series, its intended audience is younger teenage boys.

[RELATED: Black Butler, Soul Eater, and Other Manga Are Facing New Book Bans]

Controversial Manga Banned in Schools Over Violent Content

Assassination Classroom Isn’t the Only Manga To Get Hit With Book Bans In the U.S.

On various occasions, the manga series “Assassination Classroom” has faced censorship in U.S. schools. For instance, Gifford Middle School in east Florida removed it from their libraries in March 2023 due to numerous complaints. Subsequently, the Elmbrook School District in Wisconsin took the same action. However, “Assassination Classroom” isn’t alone in this predicament. In August 2024, Brevard Public Schools in Florida also banned the first volume of the popular boys’ love manga, “Sasaki & Miyano,” during a school board meeting. This decision was made following an anonymous complaint about the book’s content, which argued that sexual orientation should not be promoted or implied in educational settings. Despite being rated for teenagers and lacking explicit content, the complainant asserted that there is no educational value in making homosexual books available at school.

The manga series ‘Sasaki & Miyano’ is well-known, spanning ten volumes. It focuses on two male high school students, Sasaki and Miyano Yoshizaku, who eventually find themselves with romantic feelings for each other. Despite his attraction to girls, Miyano secretly enjoys reading boys’ love manga, which he keeps hidden due to embarrassment. He confides in his friend and classmate, Sasaki, about the stories he reads. Sasaki, who is more outgoing than Miyano, helps him to come out of his shell throughout the series. It’s Sasaki who first realizes that he might be developing romantic feelings for his friend. The series gained immediate popularity when it started releasing in 2016 and has since led to a spin-off series and an anime adaptation by Studio Deen.

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2024-11-19 22:39