UN shares Malala line

UN Geneva reposted Malala Yousafzai’s line “The extremists are afraid of books and pens” on its X account, pairing that quote with a message about Education for All. (x.com) Malala first delivered that line in her United Nations address on July 12, 2013, speaking at the UN Youth Assembly on what the UN called “Malala Day.” (news.un.org) The UN post arrives as book censorship in the United States has spiked: PEN America recorded 6,870 instances of book bans in the 2024–2025 school year across 23 states and 87 public school districts. (usatoday.com) Advocacy groups say the longer trend is even larger: PEN America and allied reporting count roughly 22,810 school book removals and challenges in U.S. public schools since 2021. (pen.org) State and local actions have included new laws and policy moves that restrict classroom materials, with reporting in 2025 documenting Texas proposals and other measures that could penalize librarians and teachers. (ilovelibraries.org) The UN framing links Malala’s 2013 message back to the UN’s Education For All agenda and ongoing global campaigns led by the UN Special Envoy for Global Education, a role held by Gordon Brown since 2012. (un.org) (educationenvoy.org) By amplifying Malala’s sentence about “books and pens,” UN Geneva foregrounded books as a political front in current fights over curriculum, access, and library collections while judicial and policy battles — including PEN America’s litigation efforts in 2025 — continue to play out. (pen.org)