I’m With The Banned is a series that aims to promote books that have been recently challenged as unsuitable for young readers, giving parents and readers a deeper understanding of the themes involved. This blog post is focused on Flamer, a semi-autobiographical graphic novel by Mike Curato.
About Flamer
Flamer is a coming-of-age story based on the life of its author, Mike Curato. Set in the 90s, many aspects of Aiden’s identity are challenged during his last week of summer camp—especially his sexuality, race, and faith. He is bullied for his effeminate qualities, with many boys calling him homophobic slurs, and he is also called "Chinese" over and over even after he makes it clear he’s Filipino. Meanwhile, Aiden is slowly coming to terms with the fact he has a crush on another male camper, Elias, and what that means for him and his religious identity.
The world Aiden finds himself in is one that, hopefully, many younger readers wouldn’t recognize—one with calling cards, cursive handwriting, and culturally accepted homophobia. Throughout Flamer, Aiden experiences the anti-LGBTQ+ culture of the 90s from his peers and authority figures. His fellow campers liberally use homophobic slurs and bully him for his stereotypically feminine qualities, and the camp’s leaders encourage toxic masculinity and “boys will be boys” behavior. Even in church, Aiden’s pastor preaches fire and brimstone. Aiden’s authority figures ultimately fail him when they fire a camp counselor named Ted for being gay. Eventually, Aiden feels completely ostracized in every aspect of his life.
One of the major reasons Aiden struggles to come to terms with his sexuality is because he is Christian. His environment does not encourage an intersection between Christianity and homosexuality. In other words, if Aiden is a Christian and exhibits Christian practices and values, he can’t be gay. And vice versa. In Flamer, Aiden is an altar server at his church, even after many of his peers quit when they reached high school, and he continues to attend a nondenominational service while at camp. So, when Aiden starts crushing on fellow male camper Elias, the dissonance between that and his religion causes him to consider suicide. Unfortunately, this is a common thread in many LGBTQ+ personal accounts.
In the end, Aiden receives a life-saving vision of his spirit as a warrior wreathed in flames who asserts—despite everything his environment is telling him—that Aiden is enough. In the afterword, Mike Curato writes: “Fear and hope are bound up together inside of us, alongside our flaws and our divinity” (pg. 364). Aiden can be a man even with effeminate qualities, gay and Christian, redeemed and human.
Flamer is about acceptance and hope in a culture of hatred.
Challenges:
There are a couple reasons why Flamer might be challenged. One is that it features LGBTQ+ characters and themes. According to PEN America, an organization advocating for freedom of expression in literature, of all the titles banned in the first half of the 2022-2023 school year, “26% of unique titles banned have LGBTQ+ characters or themes.” In Flamer, Aiden struggles to accept his sexual identity, and some of the scenes showing his struggle are sexually charged (e.g., seeing his crush in the shower). Some of these scenes can seem vulgar; however, nothing in Flamer is pornographic—even the artwork. Scenes are either censored or fade to black.
While not pornography, Flamer is still told from the POV of a teenage boy surrounded by other teenaged boys. A lot of the dialogue between characters is centered around their bodies and colored by violence and toxic masculinity (e.g., penis jokes, objectifying girls, and sexual rites of passage). I was shocked to read this kind of content because I didn’t experience it growing up as a girl. However, after talking to some guy friends, they all just shrugged and said Flamer was accurate—the language, the attitude, the behavior, everything. If younger readers are already exposed to this type of content, it might be eye-opening to see how that behavior impacts other people, encouraging empathy and preventing a hostile environment for LGBTQ+ people.
On the other hand, Flamer might be challenged because it reflects outdated gender theories. One example is how Aiden is considered gay by his peers because of his stereotypically feminine qualities—like his enjoyment of arts and crafts and his higher-pitched voice. Modern gender theories no longer connect gender presentation with sexuality. In other words, even if a boy is wearing a dress, that doesn’t mean he is gay. If a girl doesn’t wear dresses, she is not automatically a lesbian. A reader not familiar with the LGBTQ+ community might read Flamer and assume that feminine qualities in male characters equate to gayness. To learn more about the differences between gender and sexuality, click here.
Sensitive readers might want to watch out for:
- Language (including homophobic and racial slurs)
- Crude and sometimes vulgar humor
- Mention of sexual acts
- Internalized homophobia
- Suicide ideation
- Family trauma
