Interview With The Librarian.

Well, today Meghan and I went to our local library to see one of the librarian's who worked there. (Privacy issues shall keep her name anonymous.) We discussed the book banning issue and had a few other issues with her and here is what was said.

Question: How long have you been a children's librarian?
Answer: A children's librarian 11 years. A typical librarian? ...More than 11 years.

Question: Has anyone ever requested that any material be removed, banned or otherwise restricted?
Answer: That's a regular occurrence in every library, hundreds of thousands. And the most challenged book? The Bible. Though we have people requesting the books to not be banned but to simply be moved to a different section.

Question: How did you respond to that?
Answer: The library has a very formal, detailed procedure. First they have to identify themselves and why they want to book removed. It takes a lot of people to formally remove a book, but that's a big step, and hardly anyone asks for a book to be formally removed, more often they challenge.

Question: What are your opinions on book censorship?
Answer: I don't believe in book censorship. It's a yes or no answer for librarians. We have very adamant freedom of speech. I have read Lot's of books, some I don't care much for, but I will "fight to the death" for them to be in the library because it's some one's opinion, or point of view.
Though we won't have hateful literature in our libraries.

Question: Do you think that parents should be responsible for what their children read and nobody Else's?
Answer: Yes a child's parent's word is final. We encourage parents to read with their children. They have the right to know what their children are reading, just like when your parents read picture books to you when you were little, they knew what you were reading.

Question: Any other comments on this issue?
Answer: Well, it's been going on since books were being published, because some people think books are threatening, and want to get rid of the threat, so the books have been challenged. Those people have the Right to their opinion.

And that's pretty much all we did with our beloved children's librarian. Thank you for reading and have a good day.

The Children Think For Themselves

A common reason used for banning, removing, reclassifying, labeling or restricting books is that the controversial content within them will come into the hands of children.

This is usually used on Young Adult books, not adult books. So I'll be talking about YA books for this particular post.

Most libraries have a children's section and a young adult(or teen) section separate from eachother. The teen section is usually classified as 12 or 13 and up. There's an obvious reason for this, teens are very different from children, in interests, behaviours, experiences and especially maturity. The books reflect this. That's why the YA section is separate from the children's section to begin with.

I already covered mature content in my 'Perks of Being A Wallflower' post so I won't go on about that again.

The YA section is usually near the children's section and quite a few people seem to worry about children wandering into the YA section and reading books that aren't appropriate for them. That doesn't happen. Maybe once in a blue moon but it's hardly a common occurence. Why?

1) Children that should be reading books in the children's section aren't going to be interested in books in the YA section. They're usually of considerable length, have no pictures, are above their reading level, and often have pretty dull covers (Side note: Can we stop giving publishers stock photos of teenage girls in tank tops? Please?). They are designed to be marketed to teens, not children.

2) Children know what's inappropriate for them. A bit of personal experience here. When I was a wee one, I was honestly a little scared of the "Young Adult" and "Adult" sections. It's children's logic, "Adult means grown-up. Those are for grown-ups, they must be scary." Maybe that was just me, but most children understand what "adult" means.

3) If it bothers them, they'll put it down. Kids may not have had much life experience, but they're definitly smart enough to stop reading something if they don't like it. If it bothers them, they'll stop reading it and move onto something else. Simple as that. I did this once or twice when I was little, although the books I put down were "Scary story" books but it takes all kinds.

So frankly, all this "Think of the children!" jabber needs to stop. for the reasons above and because it's simply an excuse for censorship. If you're concerned about your children reading something inappropriate, go with them to the library and supervise them. I've said it before and I'll say it again: The public library is there to serve EVERYONE, what you consider inappropriate someone else will consider wonderful, and it is YOUR job to parent YOUR children.

Our local library actually has a policy that says that no children under 9 years of age are allowed to be left alone in the library unsupervised. Thank you.

P.S. Angel_of_Death and I are going on holiday this upcoming weekend and school starts shortly after that. Our blog posts will be slightly less frequent but we'll try to update often. Cheers :)!

Book Banning and the Stupidity Thereof

Hello there! Meghan here to talk to you about book banning. Which will be a very constant subject on this blog.

Book banning is when one person or a group of people try to remove a book for any number of reasons from a public library, school library, class reading list, or occasionally a bookstore for various reasons. Usually because of sexual or homosexual content that is perceived is "indecent." Books are most often made unavailable to children through this method, without restricting access for adults.

Book banning is not a modern invention. Throughout history, books (most often religious texts) have been banned and even burned (book burnings still happen today, even in North America, twisted huh?). In the Tudor era, Protestants burnt the Lutheran version of the Bible (and the Lutherans themselves if they refused to convert, but that's an entirely different can of worms) because they considered the teachings to be heresy.

Examples of books most commonly challenged in the United States at the moment include To Kill A Mockingbird, Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, The Color Purple, and The Outsiders.

I personally think book banning is absolutely ridiculous and it's reasoning is flawed. Besides that, it violates civil rights of free speech (at least in Canada and the United States, I'm not sure of laws in other countries). If you do not like the content in a book, you do not have to read it. I repeat, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO READ IT. Isn't free will great?

It bugs me even more when it involves a public library. Specifically people trying to remove a book or relocate it from the children or young adult section to a special "reserve shelf" or the adult's section.

Before I continue I'm going to politely ask you to watch this video, I'll wait until you finish: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8aLRBhNUmo

Back? Good.

I don't have a problem with someone thinking a particular book or a group of books isn't appropriate for their children. But a public library is for THE PUBLIC. Meaning EVERYONE. Meaning OTHER PEOPLE WHO OFTEN HAVE DIFFERENT BELIEFS THAN YOUR OWN. And nobody has any right to say "This book is inappropriate for all children who visit this library ". Because the same book that would be inappropriate for your child might really help another. That's why there are books about abuse, rape, drugs, alcohol, sex, homosexuality and bisexuality, because there are kids out there who don't have anyone to talk to and they need these kinds of books. That's why they belong on the shelves.

So, instead of removing a book from the library or putting it on a special reserve shelf that requires parental permission to check out, how about actually going to the library with your children and making sure what they're checking out is appropriate for your household?

And putting that responsibility on the librarians is stupid. The librarians are there to do their job, not act in loco parentis for your children or anyone's children. They are there to serve everyone, not just you.

We may not like what we hear or see or read but we have the ability to not listen or not look. Books are ideas, banning a book is the same as putting tape over someone's mouth.