Book Censorship News, September 29, 2023

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On September twenty seventh, we shared the outcomes of EachLibrary and Book Riot’s survey on dad or mum perceptions of public libraries. This has been such a useful partnership, and the outcomes are fascinating — in each promising and regarding methods. This is the primary of three deliberate surveys, so count on to see extra of our outcomes very quickly. Kelly and I’ve been engaged on this for fairly some time, so we’re excited to share the outcomes with you. She’s out on a well-deserved break for the subsequent week, so I’m filling in on Censorship News.

cover of How to Fight Book Bans and Censorship ebook by Book Riot

A bit of little bit of housekeeping earlier than we get into the excellent news from the survey. For Banned Books Week, October 2nd-Sixth, Book Riot’s How to Fight Book Bans and Censorship e book will likely be on sale for $1.99, beginning Monday. This e-book compiles essentially the most well timed and related of our censorship protection, together with historic background, sensible ideas, graphics to share, and different sources. All the essays on this assortment have been up to date. Author Alex London calls it a “vital resource for educators and librarians, and for communities who have had enough extremism and want the context and the tools to defend freedom of speech in our schools and libraries.” I’ll remind you once more in regards to the sale subsequent week, however I needed to provide you a heads-up earlier than the final day of the sale!

As I discussed, the outcomes of this survey are a blended bag. There are some encouraging solutions and a few upsetting ones, particularly with regards to perceptions of LGBTQ youngsters’s books. For as we speak, I needed to have a good time the outcomes that present that folks really feel their youngsters are secure on the library, that almost all have by no means been uncomfortable with a e-book their little one checked out, and that they consider e-book bans infringe on their parental rights.

One of essentially the most clear and decisive responses on this survey was to the query of whether or not dad and mom and guardians really feel their youngsters are secure on the library. For all of the fear-mongering about “pornography” within the youngsters’ part or librarians as “groomers,” 92% stated they do really feel their youngsters are secure on the library.

a graphic with the text Has your child ever checked out a book that made you feel uncomfortable? (66% No) and Has your child every checked out a book that made them feel uncomfortable? (67% No)

If you watch the college board conferences that go viral on-line, you’d assume youngsters in libraries are always being bombarded by express or upsetting materials. Instead, two-thirds of respondents stated that their little one has by no means checked out a e-book that made them (the dad or mum) or the kid uncomfortable.

It’s price noting that even when a baby had checked out a e-book that made them uncomfortable, that’s not essentially a foul factor. Learning could be uncomfortable, particularly if it’s about issues like puberty and sexual schooling or bigotry.

Besides, enthusiastic readers are in all probability going to locate a e-book that makes them uncomfortable — perhaps they thought they have been prepared for the content material and weren’t, perhaps that fantasy novel is simply too scary in spite of everything, or perhaps it’s only a matter they don’t take pleasure in studying about. Luckily, all of us have the liberty to place that e-book down and choose one thing else, and often, we study a bit about ourselves within the course of.

a slide from the survey results with the title Parents' Opinions on Book Bans and the text A waste of time: 67% Infringe on parents' rights: 74%, Teens should have access: 82%

Some different encouraging outcomes embody that two-thirds of respondents agree or considerably agree that “banning books is a waste of time,” and 74% agree or considerably agree with the assertion “Book bans infringe on my right to make decisions for my children.”

In truth, 90% of respondents agree or considerably agree that, as dad and mom, they’re those who ought to be making choices about what their little one reads. For all of the discuss of “I don’t co-parent with the government” or defending “liberty,” e-book bans require that governments or officers make choices about what books youngsters have entry to as a substitute of their dad and mom.

When requested who ought to make choices about which books are included in a library, 58% stated librarians versus 22% for native elected officers and 18% by the state legislature.

A pie chart with the results of the question “Libraries should carry children's books that discuss complex topics like racism and sex.”

Two-thirds additionally agree or considerably agree that libraries ought to embody youngsters’s books on advanced matters like racism and intercourse. 89% agree or considerably agree that characters in books “should be diverse and reflect multiple communities.”

This isn’t a whole win, as I discussed. Some of the outcomes are a lot much less optimistic, and I like to recommend you learn via all the outcomes for a full image. Next week, I’ll pull out a number of the extra regarding responses within the survey.

If e-book banning and censorship are topics that matter to you, please share these survey outcomes with family and friends in addition to on social media. They may additionally be helpful for the librarians in your life to find out about.

Now, onto the tales of the week. This time, I’ve divided it by state, and you’ll shortly discover simply what number of states are represented right here. Florida and Texas are main in e-book bans, however this touches each a part of the nation.

Book Censorship News: September 29, 2023

Alabama:

The e-book ban group “Clean Up Alabama” desires Alabama to chop ties with the American Library Association, a transfer that Alabama Republicans are supporting. The director of the Alabama Public Library Service, Dr. Nancy Pack, argued that “severing ties with the American Library Association (ALA) would be a disservice to the principles of intellectual freedom, education, and democratic discourse that our society holds dear.”
Ozark Library is requiring all youngsters 13 and underneath to be accompanied by an grownup (up from 10), is including advised age vary stickers to the spines of the Young Adult books, and is posting indicators reminding dad and mom they might not agree with all of the books and to oversee their youngsters. I’m positive that can forestall any future complaints! (As an apart, age vary stickers will push teenagers away from books they might have learn and beloved as a result of they’re labelled with a youthful age vary. It stigmatizes teenagers and adults with decrease studying ranges.)
A librarian in Huntsville-Madison County Public Library was advised to maneuver a protracted record of kids’s books to the Adult Nonfiction part, most with LGBTQ topic headers. It even included a e-book that had an writer with the final title “Gay.”

Florida:

While Florida boasts the very best variety of e-book bans of any state, Clay County accounts for a 3rd of Florida’s e-book bans, and Bruce Friedman is chargeable for 94% of the books on Clay County’s challenged record. The county might ban 1000’s extra books. It’s price clicking that final hyperlink for the form of issues being stated at these conferences, like calling a e-book about teen drug habit “filthy, filthy pornography” and a board member saying difficult-to-understand books ought to be eliminated: “There’s a book in here that I read and couldn’t even understand. And I am smart.”
The college district superintendent advised public college librarians of Charlotte County, Florida, to take away all books with LGBTQ characters from college and classroom libraries, saying books with “[t]hese characters and themes cannot exist.” The college district denies these allegations, saying they’re simply eradicating “inappropriate” and “explicit” books, not particularly concentrating on LGBTQ books.
Even attorneys are having a tough time deciphering precisely what Florida’s book-banning legal guidelines imply, as some e-mail exchanges reveal.
Community teams and church buildings throughout Florida are instructing Black historical past after the state eliminated AP African American History from state colleges.
In Jacksonville, Florida, greater than 200 activists and lecturers gathered throughout a convention to protest censorship, particularly because it pertains to the instructing of Black historical past, by studying from authors whose work has been restricted throughout the state, like Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison, James Baldwin, and others.
During a six-hour-long college board assembly in Volusia County, Florida, members of Moms for Liberty saved insisting on studying passages from books they needed faraway from college libraries regardless of the board stating that there ought to be objection types submitted.
Former Coordinator of Library Services Michelle White leaves Florida’s Escambia county colleges and the state for Colorado with household, stating restrictive laws and the stress of coping with e-book bans as the explanations.

Idaho:

A county sheriff in Kootenai, Idaho, has taken it upon himself to analyze libraries, on the lookout for sexually express materials within the youngsters’s part and filming what he finds. He beforehand supported laws that will permit dad and mom to sue libraries for $2,500 in damages in the event that they felt their little one was uncovered to content material that’s “harmful to minors.”

Iowa:

Maine:

In Cumberland, a dad or mum acquired into an argument with board members after they advised him to place down his signal with pictures from Gender Queer on it. He’s been making an attempt to have the e-book banned since July.

Washington:

Dayton Library in Columbia County, WA, has confronted loads of e-book challenges not too long ago. The earlier director refused to take away books, however he resigned after getting uninterested in the battle. The new director tried to assuage e-book banners by creating a brand new “parenting” part with the challenged books — shock, shock, that wasn’t sufficient for e-book banners, in order that they sued the library and tried to have it closed. The library has gained the lawsuit and can stay open.