Quietly for Good

     Libraries are often thought of as quiet places.  They are quiet places where gentle people work quietly for the good of the community.  It's almost a sacred image.  For this reason, when someone finds and challenges a perceived threat to public decency among the stacks, they often expect the librarian to be as shocked as they are.  They assume the librarian will be mortified that such pestilence would have crept into their carefully tended garden while they weren't looking.  A concerned complainer rarely expects the library to defend what they had hoped to eradicate.  Yet, libraries generally stand squarely opposed to censorship of any kind.

     One might think that this is some misplaced affection for all books.  While it's true most library professionals and paraprofessionals do love books, I have seen ruthless weeding operations when room had to be cleared for new acquisitions.  It's no place to be squeamish or overly sentimental.

     One might then conclude that they like offensive material or that they agree with the opinions and ideas presented in challenged material.  That would be wrong, also.  I've known librarians who were just as offended by material but who chose to keep it anyway.  In fact, I knew a director who said that if there wasn't something to offend you in the public library, then they weren't doing their job.  The reasoning goes back to a library's primary mission.  The library provides access to the information its patrons want.  Since humans are all different, with different tastes, ideas and opinions, a wide spectrum is required.  Whether a book is on the shelf or not has nothing to do with perceptions of morality, and whether you are able to read what you want to read should not be someone else's decision.  Neither should it be someone else's decision what your kids can read.  Nobody needs to protect the public from the dangerous ideas in books.  We need to be protected from those who seek to limit our intellectual freedom.

     That's where librarians stand.  When they defend an offensive book, movie or other material, they are really defending you and your right to have your own mind.  This is a fundamental belief in intellectual freedom- that NOBODY has the right to tell you what you can think or read.  It's embodied in the American Library Association's Freedom to Read Statement and has inspired the campaign of censorship awareness known as Banned Books Week .  So, go ahead and read, and know that there are legions of librarians quietly defending your right to do so.

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