‘My Heart Sank’: In Maine, a Challenge to a Book, and to a Town’s Self-Image

Wealthy, liberal-leaning Blue Hill prided itself on staying above the fray — until the library stocked a book that drew anger from the left.

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The Blue Hill Public Library faced backlash for carrying a book that suggests gender dysphoria is a “diagnostic craze” fueled by adolescent confusion.

Rich Boulet, the director of the Blue Hill Public Library, was working in his office when a regular patron stopped by to ask how to donate a book to the library. “You just hand it over,” Mr. Boulet said.

The book was “Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters,” by the journalist Abigail Shrier. The book posits that gender dysphoria is a “diagnostic craze” fueled by adolescent confusion, social media and peer influence, and that teenagers are too young to undergo potentially irreversible gender transition surgery.

Many transgender people and their advocates say the book is harmful to trans youth, and some have tried to suppress its distribution.

“If I’m being totally honest, my heart sank when I saw it,” Mr. Boulet recalled.

Founded in 1796, the library has a $7.9 million endowment in a coastal enclave popular among affluent summer residents. Blue Hill delivered a 35-point victory for Joseph R. Biden Jr. in the 2020 presidential race. The communities around it are a blend of liberal, conservative and none-of-your-business, all of which helped its library resist political proxy battles like those roiling the nation’s libraries.

But in mid-2021, the Blue Hill library and its leadership were tested in a way none of them anticipated.

Image“I want the library to be there for everybody, not just people who share my voting record,” said Rich Boulet, the director of the Blue Hill Public Library.Credit…Tristan Spinski for The New York Times

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