Dana Hills High School Under Fire For Sexual Reading Material Available For Students

Reform CAPOUSD, a parental rights activist group in the Capistrano Unified School District, shared a video via social media of a woman expressing her dismay at the school's decision to include such books in the curriculum and urged for more age-appropriate content.

Dana Hills High School is the latest California public school to come under fire for exposing underage children to sexually inappropriate reading material after a concerned parent read an excerpt from a book available in the campus library.

Reform CAPOUSD, a parental rights activist group in the Capistrano Unified School District, shared a video via social media of a woman expressing her dismay at the school's decision to include such books in the curriculum and urged for more age-appropriate content.

The book in question is Chuck Palahniuk’s “Invisible Monster,” which follows the story of a young woman seeking a new identity after her disfigured face ends her modeling career. The book contains a list of concerns ranging from graphic sexual activities involving a minor to alternative gender ideologies.

“If your child goes to Dana High, you need to call the school and demand that this book is removed and search the library for more like this because Dana High's Library is full of sexually explicit material just like this one,” the group wrote on its Instagram page. 

During the video shared by the group, an unidentified woman argued that children should not be exposed to explicit material, such as oral sex and pornography, at such a young age.

“As a parent during COVID, my eyes were open to what was being taught in our schools — the sexual material in our schools, whether it is an assignment, sex education, or sexually explicit material that is accessible to our kids,” she said.

The meeting appeared to discuss reasons why enrollment in the district is down during the current school year. Superintendent Chris Brown previously reported that his schools have lost 20 percent of their student enrollment over the past 15 years. 

During the 2022-2023 school year, local media reported the district saw a loss of a thousand students.

“This is a pattern that's being mirrored by most districts in the state of California; I believe 98 percent of state districts have declining enrollment as California is experiencing a wave of emigration away from the state and lower birth rates,” Brown said in February.

However, the concerned speaker attributed the declining enrollment to the wave of parents who got an inside look at the curriculum children were learning online during the pandemic.  

“Why in the world would this book, “Invisible Monsters,” be allowed in any school?,” she said. “Even high school? This book is one of the most disturbing books I have read. This small paragraph isn’t even the worst part about the book.”