Sarah Dunne starts our panel with a paper that charts the transnational history of activism across the UK, Canada, and the US to defend queer bookstores in the 1980s from the confiscation of “obscene materials” by border patrol agents and police. Kyler Chittick tracks legal battles over Canada’s obscenity laws in the 1980s and uses Edmonton as a case study to show how the homophobia embedded in these laws are part and parcel of a much longer history of moral regulation. Tom Hooper examines the history of homophobic policing in Toronto by recovering the story of Don Franco, who had his house raided by police in May 1979 after placing an ad in a gay magazine for a sexual encounter and was subsequently arrested on charges of “keeping a common-bawdy house” after police discovered an S/M dungeon in the basement. Finally, Tyler Carson turns to the expulsion of the North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) from gay and lesbian rights organizing in the 1990s to reflect on the politics of queer censorship. Tom Hooper will serve as chair.

Together these papers offer historical insight into understanding the recent spate of queer and trans sex panics sweeping across the United States and Canada. While their contexts and particularities may differ, these case studies offer valuable lessons to those seeking to understand the longer histories of queer censorship.