Can we keep politics out of literature? BookTok is divided.
Like any good story, BookTok itself is reaching what feels like a climax in its newest conflict. The once-unified community has become a battleground over politics and how it intersects with writers, influencers, readers, and the books themselves.
In a viral video that has since been taken down, TikTok creator @Kenzies, who deleted their account in the aftermath, said they wanted people to "do better" and "leave politics out of BookTok" because it is meant to be a "safe space." It might sound like they're encouraging people to separate the art from the artist, one side of a classic debate. But many creators don't see a way to critique and engage with books — the core use of BookTok — without acknowledging the politics of them. And this is all bubbling up to the surface while political book bans and accusations of anti-intellectualism further polarize the community.
Some of the most-viewed videos advocating for a "politics-free" BookTok tend to come from creators who have openly supported Donald Trump and say they've significant backlash. For instance, one creator, @jacobsreadingg, shared a video with over 200,000 views using an audio clip of an expletive-filled rant to express the intense reaction he allegedly received after disclosing his political stance.
The comment section is understandably divided. The most-liked comment comes from a reader who typically reads fantasy, arguing that "most of the books I read are about people rebelling against the government or kingdom or some corrupted power," which is inherently political. But the second most-liked comment argues that the politicization of BookTok has made her feel unwelcome. There is no consensus.
These comments cut to the core of the debate on BookTok: Can someone support President-elect Donald Trump while claiming their political views don’t influence their reading choices or are reading and politics inherently linked? For New York Times bestselling author Victoria Aveyard, the answer is simple.
"If you're gonna hold up that argument of 'let's keep politics out of BookTok' but then also not allow people to talk about the politics of those said books, not to actually critically engage in the books, then I'm not quite sure what we can use BookTok for at all," Aveyard said in a TikTok video. "I don't know how we're having any kind of disagreement over whether or not books are political because...no piece of art, no book, is written in a vacuum because no artist, no writer, no person exists in a vacuum. We are all products of our upbringing, of our environment, of our context, of our awareness, and of our perspective."
The political tensions on BookTok aren't new. TikTok creator Raghad (@finepressedition) highlighted that discussions around "anti-intellectualism" began surfacing in the community about two years ago. The debate centered on whether readers who approach books purely for enjoyment, without critical analysis, promote anti-intellectualism. But, as Aveyard points out, there are complexities to this argument.
"Even if you're someone who admittedly or proudly says, 'My books are no thoughts, just vibes,' I hate to tell you this, that is still a thought," Aveyard explained on TikTok. "You are still having thoughts even when you are writing 'no thoughts, just vibes.' Everything is a choice, everything is a product of your perspective, everything is a part of something you want to say, whether you think it is or not… You cannot have a piece of art that is divorced from the environment in which it was created." Aveyard argues that discussing politics on BookTok should be a given because it's inherently tied to the craft of writing and how one’s perspective shapes one's work.
Additionally, the right to read is under attack. BookTok is, at its core, a celebration of the consumption of books — and any conversation about consumption needs to include an interrogation of access. Financially, books can be a hefty expense, and libraries make them far more equitable — but libraries are facing stark funding cuts across the country. Multiple states have legislation that allows librarians and library workers to be prosecuted, and, according to EveryLibrary, 73 individual libraries were on the ballot in 2024. Many people literally voted on books this year.
Book bans are a political reality, and voting — or political engagement — is one way to combat them. While the conservative party attempts book banning more often than the democratic party, neither is innocent of attempts. According to PEN American and the ALA, conservative groups tend to target books written by or about people of color and LGBTQ people, such as The Hate U Give, The Bluest Eye, Gender Queer, and All Boys Aren't Blue. Liberal groups tend to target books with racist themes, like Of Mice and Men and some Dr. Seuss titles that use racist imagery and language.
"We’re seeing organized political attacks on our libraries and on our school libraries, intending to limit books to what is politically approved, morally approved, that fits the narrow agenda of the groups that are bringing these challenges," the director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom Deborah Caldwell-Stone told MSNBC in 2023.
It is important to note that even though both parties seek to ban books in some way, the number of books liberals want to ban is dwarfed by the huge swath of books conservatives look to ban.
Ultimately, the rift on BookTok seems to be shrinking an already niche community into even smaller factions.
People who view books as inherently political have divided into distinct groups: one for Trump supporters, another for those who favor Democratic figures like Vice President Kamala Harris, and perhaps a third for those who choose not to vote at all. Meanwhile, creators who believed that books and politics could be kept separate carved out their own space. This fracturing of BookTok mirrors the world outside — highlighting the polarization and lack of curiosity that often defines today’s discourse. The result has been a wave of blocking and unfollowing, dubbed by some as an "unfollow party," leaving others saddened by the loss of community and not leaving anyone particularly thrilled.
"Y'all asked for BookTok not to be a place that is political," Mrs. Yang (@them_yangs) said in a TikTok with nearly 700,000 views. "And people honored your boundary and blocked you so you would no longer see them on your feed, and now you are crashing out because strangers on the internet don't want to be friends with you. OK, beloved."
The conversations among writers, editors, readers, and BookTok influencers echo broader societal divides — between those who feel they can compartmentalize politics from other aspects of life and those who argue that even seemingly apolitical choices, like the books we read or how we discuss them, carry ideological implications. Is it possible to create a space for book lovers if political issues are excluded? Or is the concept inherently flawed since art, literature, and community are inseparably intertwined with politics?
Creators and audiences are left to grapple with whether a space for "just books" can ever really exist — or if that very goal undermines what makes literature powerful and unifying in the first place.