Posted on 11/12/2011 2:49:57 PM PST by markomalley
Parents of Emerson Elementary in Compton, California, are up in arms over the school’s decision to invite former porn star Sasha Grey to read to a group of first and third-grade students, at an National Education Association-sponsored event called Read Across America.
TMZ obtained photos of the event, but when they contacted school administrators, they were less than forthcoming about the decision to invite the winner of the 2010 AVN award for best anal sex scene. The award is sponsored and presented by the adult video industry trade magazine Adult Video News.
The school district flatly denied inviting the former porn star, telling TMZ, “we have several celebrities who read to our students each year. The actress you have indicated [Sasha] was not present.”
But Grey herself tweeted about the experience.
“Spent the am with Read Across America Compton, reading to the sweetest 1st & 3rd grade students @ Emerson Elementary,” read a November 2nd post.
Grey is an author herself, having published “Neu Sex,” a collection of artistic photos and essays, back in March.
After the photos were released, she defended her decision to participate in a statement, saying “I have a past that some people may not agree with, but it does not define who I am. I will not live in fear of it. To challenge non-profit education programs is an exercise in futility, counter-productive and anti-educational.”
Perhaps the administrators initially thought that Grey’s recent career change toward more mainstream roles made her a more appropriate elementary school guest. The actress, who once won a Best Oral Sex award for her film “Throat: A Cautionary Tale,” has since acted in a film directed by Steven Soderbergh and appeared regularly in HBO’s Entourage.
“From now on I will not be playing roles where I play a version of myself, or a hooker, for a very long time,” she told Fox News. “I think ‘The Girlfriend Experience’ and ‘Entourage’ were the best places to play those two roles and it can’t get any better. I don’t want to repeat myself, and I think if I continue to take those types of roles I will only be given those roles.”
“The National Education Association and their local partners should take steps to insure that the Read Across America program does not introduce children to notorious performers of pornography,” Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council told The Daily Caller. “Parents have every right to be outraged about her appearance.”
But Frederick Hess, and education policy expert at the American Enterprise Institute doesn’t see what the big deal is.
“If she was talking about adult films or other inappropriate subjects, thats obviously another question. But only problem I have with this … is the district’s lack of candor,” he told TheDC.
Emerson Elementary School principal Sydney Ritchey-Burnett and the NEA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
According to the NEA’s website, Read Across America is “an annual reading motivation and awareness program that calls for every child in every community to celebrate reading on March 2, the birthday of beloved children’s author Dr. Seuss.”
She read “Dog Breath,” by Dave Pilkey.
Nobody with a hyphenated name should be anywhere near a public school. ;-)
Liberalism at its finest:CTA-NEA altogether now, PERVERTS. LOL
There's an award category for that? I didn't know confusion over anatomy required talent or justified recognition. And someone in California thinks the winner is a good role model for early elementary school children? Amazing.
I’m betting that none of the little boys in that class complained.
FYI......
at least we don't have to wonder if she is [blanked] in the head. we can look up the video if we wish.
A proud Penn State grad I see.
She can read me a bedtime story,,,
I can live with the idea of a former porn actor/tress getting their act together, obtaining an education degree, if it means that their former is a former life and they wouldn’t go back to it or let anybody know that it what they did.
It is reprehensible, imo, to allow a porn actor to read to school kids, because they won the equivalent of a porn Emmy.
Boggles the mind.
More evidence that our nation has gone insane.
Who is their next guest reader, Jerry Sandusky?
Who are we to impose our moral values on others? /sarc
Her story choice? “Goldilocks does the three bears.”
Exactly. But if that was her intent, she'd go as Marina Ann Hantzis, not Sasha Grey.
(high pitched voice) - "Uhhh what award did you win?"
Try explaining that one.
I saw this earlier. I looked her up. Having a past one is ashamed of would be, I don’t know, being a drug dealer, maybe a thief. Getting up in the morning, going to some movie studio, taking your clothes off and having every kind of sex possible with 8 or 9 guys, at the same time, that you’ve never seen before and may well never see again, is going well beyond that. That’s just pure psycho in my book. She should not be anywhere near children.
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