https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2023/08/town-fires-librarian-who-worked-there-for-11-years-because-she-refused-to-remove-lgbtq-books/
One resident toured the teen section and claimed 60% of the books were "witchcraft...
Literal Hitler lovers. We should treat them the same way we treated.
the Nazis during WWII
So sit silently while they gain popularity and power until they're so big we need a global conflict to figure our shit out?
And then after the war grant a bunch of them US citizenship in exchange for them to work on behalf of the US govt on projects the US stole from Nazi Germany after the war.
I still find it amusing that America made it to the moon on the back of the nazi who created the v2 rocket.
I think given Lemmy's user group, we should start a movement to download and archive as much LGBTQ+ content as possible and stowaway the drives so that if the fascists take power, they won't be very effective at actually getting rid of such knowledge.
They literally quoted Hitler in a big isolated box on top of one of their groups' newsletters, and when there was a moment of silence for Holocaust victims at the town meeting following the incident, they coughed through it.
That's pretty goddamn hateful.
This trans book reading example is ridiculous. It was never something people had to do. Kids were never being randomly sat down to do it. It was an intentional thing that everybody agreed to, and was aware of ahead of time. Are you trying to tell other parents how to raise their kids? Because that's what you're doing. Why are you trying to control other people's lives?
So I should have my ability to read castrated because you think some books aren’t appropriate? I was reading college level books in elementary school, if books were gated by “age appropriateness”, I would never have become a good reader, because books “my age” were crap. You have no right to dictate what someone else can or can’t read, even your own children. People are their own, you don’t own them.
He thinks that being involved in his children's lives means he gets to dictate that other people's children are raised to be bigots.
But I don't need to be in charge of everyone else's kids in school. At this point I'm pretty sure you are trolling. You don't need every book in the library to be screened by every single parent, there would be nothing left. And certainly not screened by you if you don't even have school kids. Again - if you want your kid ignorant of everyone different from them, your remedy is homeschooling. Not censoring every challenging idea out of the public school curriculum. Some parents don't want evolution taught in school, should schools bend to them too?
Do you have kids in school? I do, and there is no indoctrination except the pledge of allegiance. If you object to what the school teaches, the remedy open to you is homeschooling, not trying to strong-arm the school down to the lowest common denominator.
And if you've ever had to do child sexual abuse/trafficking awareness training you would have learned that the risk to kids comes from people the adults trust. The preacher, the camp counselor, uncle. Not drag queens reading library books to families. That harms nobody. If you don't want to attend, don't.
Libraries, the ones my tax dollars support, should be free from religious control. Separation of church and state is constitutionally mandated. Again, if you object to this you have churches, church schools, and homeschooling, all of which are allowed. You are allowed your beliefs and biases, but not to push your restrictions on everyone else.
Back during the riots…errr, sorry the protests by BLM, the school allowed BLM flags everywhere but no pro police or support the blue flags.
It's nice to know that in addition to hating LGBTQ people, you also love it when cops murder unarmed black people for you.
Agreed. Politicians should 100% stay the fuck away from the school curriculum. Just let teachers do their job.
You're not protecting children, you're teaching them to be hateful toward gay people.
Literally nobody is trying to force your kids to be gay. You are trying to force them to be straight, though.
Moms for Liberty is a hate group. If the name has liberty or freedom in the name, it likely is a hate group.
Moms for liberty simply want to protect their kids from the wrong material.
I missed the part when books leap of their own volition from library shelves and force children to read them. If you're too worthless and lazy of a parent to monitor what your child is reading, that's on you.
Of course, this isn't about protecting children, or the parents who are screaming about it could just do that. It's about making sure no one can read things that bigots don't want them to read. It's telling that Moms For Liberty not only never has a problem with Mein Kampf being on library shelves, they quote its author in their newsletter.
Banning books about trans people is literally nazi shit. And it's why you support them.
Enough with the Nazi references
Yeah, only Moms for Liberty may make nazi references, because neither you nor they like it when people who disagree with nazis talk about them.
I'll bite. Where is your citation that hyper agressive LGBTQ parents are getting books from the library to push their agenda. And any citations for damage done to kids by men in drag reading books to third graders? These actions that Moms for liberty take have no data to back them up as being connected to protecting kids from what they say they are protecting them from. Now I will agree that doesn't prove they are a hate group. That is always a matter of opinion anyway. But your counter argument about citations counters itself since you offer no citations either. And for everyone reading, go look up the movie PCU. It's funny but also pretty accurate. Many people on both sides of the extremes are just causeheads.
“The dumbing down of America is evident in the slow decay of substantive content, a kind of celebration of ignorance.”
Carl Sagan
At a board meeting in October, one angry resident claimed her personal survey of the teen section revealed 60% of the books were “witchcraft.” Another said Gillette’s library had become an “indoctrination center.”
No one should listen to these lunatics. Sadly, they make it imperative that we pay very. Lose attention.
I don't think privatization of public goods is the best answer for this. I'd rather not let these individual private entities have so much power over a public resource. Don't want to read it, fine. It's not like they've got the Anarchist Cookbook for next week's bookclub.
Also, if public knowledge is privatized and kept from these groups, it'd give them a more substantial platform to say they're being marginalized and the system is working against them. The answer is to make sure youth are truly educated, and not simply indoctrinated into the ways of thinking their parents were. The youth needs to be taught how to form their own opinions rather than regurgitate whatever bs they have been fed
As an outsider I'm always amazed at that "land of the free" that is insistent on censoring stuff, and "home of the brave" that will run through the mud someone standing for freedom and having principles.
Once you realize that there are actually two Americas occupying the same geographic space, then everything makes more sense.
As someone born and raised here. It was always do as I say not as I do propaganda. America has been one of the most bigoted arrogant countries of the last 100 years.
America has been one of the most bigoted arrogant countries of the last 100 years.
Arrogant maybe, but bigoted? I don't agree- its not even in the top 15 compared to all the countries that have done intentional large scale genocides in the past 100 years
On the one hand, you are splitting hairs. On the other hand, Nazi Germany took notes from Jim Crow. SCOTUS is still today ignoring and invalidating treaties we signed with Native Americans. Our medical system is a slow genocide against black people, with capitalism as the cover story for why so many black women die during childbirth.
Yeah the literal holocaust, the Armenian Genocide, etc. It might seem flippant for the other person to have said that, but in the US we really do have fractal bigotry. And a fresh layer of politicians willing to cover it up by force.
Arrogant maybe, but bigoted? I don’t agree-
America was founded by religious zealots that were considered too extreme in Europe. Glad you don't agree, but history doesn't have to agree with you.
One of the bigger genocides was committed by a group that literally modeled themselves after us in many ways. Especialy the bigotry. The US and Canada were still performing genocide on first nations people into the 1970s and 80s. They're still finding unmarked mass graves. And that's not even mentioning the race massacres across the US. Of which Oklahoma was just one. And that's only the tip of the iceberg of the things that we did to ourselves. And doesn't cover any of the clandestine actions perform across the rest of the world. Destabilizing other nations. Causing constant Wars strife and suffering all for our benefit.
America was founded on bigotry. Those pilgrims. They came here because the rest of Europe didn't want to roll over and allowed them to enforced their hatred on everyone else. Not to mention the slavery even.
We've made progress since those days for sure. But generally far less than most other nations we do business with. And far less than we would like to believe.
The Civil Rights Act was signed in 1964. That was only 60 years ago.
There are pictures of Bernie Sanders being arrested while protesting segregation. Bernie isn't the oldest serving senator, and there are currently serving senators who have received "F" grades on their civil rights voting records, despite claiming to support civil rights.
I think it is entirely accurate to state that America is a bigoted nation.
Aparthied was in South Africa for much longer, now it's policies are being completely reversed- a similar thing has happened in the US.
Red America is blatantly bigoted to LGBTQ+ to the point of passing laws allowing government control over their bodies when the bigots deem appropriate. The goalposts are not all the same from one part of red america to the rest.
Red America hates immigrants openly unless they have the right skin color.
Blue America hates immigrants behind closed doors and develops programs that covertly support the upper middle class while handing out some scraps to others.
Example: Did you know your parents can be billionaires and you can get a 2bedroom luxury apartment in downtown Boston for ~250k so long as you have less than 75k in assets and less than ~80k in income? For poor people saving that much up is tough... for children of the rich though? Trivial! Get an easy cushy job that pays just below the limit and buy the 2BR apartment in downtown Boston for cheap then once the house closes have mommy and daddy get you a big paying job at one of their friends' businesses and start buying more and more housing to rent out, living in el-cheapo 250k-worth-1.5-million-apartment. You can't sell it for ~80 years, but there's nothing saying your girlfriend or mistress can't move in before then. You don't owe more than the original 250k even if you suddenly start making millions or billions of dollars. That's what I call a first time home ownership opportunity.
We (Americans) have our share of bigots, but I understand what you're trying to say. There are many theocratic dictatorships where genocide and violent intolerance is law. There are counteies that are actively engaged in state-sponsored ethnic cleansing, and people are openly hostile to outsiders.
But I would point out that our historical atrocities aren't as long ago as you seem to want them to be.
Why, because I said something is happening in the USA, you inferred that I said it's happening everywhere in it, at all time? What amaze me is people that can derive immediate generalization from a single statement.
Here's what you actually said:
As an outsider I’m always amazed at that “land of the free” that is insistent on censoring stuff, and “home of the brave” that will run through the mud someone standing for freedom and having principles.
Yes. I know. I was there. Are you implying that none of these things I said happened in the USA happened in the USA? Because, they did happen, and it was there. Kind of like what I said and you helpfully quoted.
My turn. Here's what you actually said:
I'm always amazed that people seem to think the USA is a monolith.
Feel free to point where I said the USA is a monolith. Because while I did say that these horrible thing did happen in the USA, and that the USA is known to be "land of the free, home of the brave", at no point I said, implied, or subtly hinted at that this was representative of the USA as a whole.
Reposting my comment from a while ago, with some edits:
The library I work at has had Moms for Liberty attend several meetings demanding we withdraw books that are against their beliefs, no specific titles, just a general demand. This would include anything on LGBTQ+, children’s books with rainbows, our Banned Books display, and anything promoting voting and civics education. More recently, they want us to stop holding some events, including adult focused events about race relations in the Midwest, and we should no longer host any programs funded by State and Federal grants. Lastly, they have said we need to stop allowing the staff from joining ALA or the state library association.
If any of these restrictions or censorship upsets you at all, please attend a library board meeting and voice your support for the library. Some even let you write in. Groups like MFL make it a point to attend a lot of the meetings in hopes to get their way, and it’s working.
Similarly, I attend my local govt meetings each month to stay informed on this kind of stuff TBH. Can't have these groups stunting communities and local public services to align with their twisted beliefs
As a side note... It is kinda depressing how my local community of 11k people only have at most 2 civillians besides myself attending the meetings. Do people really not care about where they live, and the local public services? The bus service here has almost been scrapped TWICE as one example, and right now a neighboring local govt is helping to pay for it for now. It won't last for long, but you can be sure as heck people will complain when they've got to drive or uber into an already traffic clogged city due to the absence of public transit.
Not enough people attend to make a case to keep services and things in a sane condition, compared to organised twisted groups who make convincing cases for the wrong things.
I think its often less about not caring, and more not having the energy, or not believing it would do any good.
This is definitely part of it. Meetings are usually at 5pm but I have seen some start at 7pm and go on for hours, looking at you budget hearings. These are important; however, the information is usually in a giant PDF or print only. I think the other part of the equation is how the municipality communicates and engages with its population.
As a librarian, I want to help with organizing the information and make it available in different formats, but it takes a lot of buy in from elected officials and other departments. Not saying that’s how all local governments work, it’s just my experience with a couple.
On a side note, Data Governance and Analytics now falls under my department. This thread just gave a goal for next year, just got to figure out how to word it.
The library I work at has had Moms for Liberty attend several meetings (…) they want us to stop holding some events, including adult focused events about race relations in the Midwest
Uh, sorry, what the FUCK? They can’t be more obvious than this.
They were arguing that teens would show up, because we don’t prevent them from attending the event. This would lead to awkward conversations that the MFL group members are not ready to have as parents.
I don’t know what universe they live in, it’s hard enough to get teens to attend programs that are focused towards them let alone something like this.
My wife is a library administrator, and getting our teen daughter to go to the library is like pulling teeth. They have a teen room and everything.
My fiance is also a librarian in the midwest and your experiences seems to mirror his. We're trying but it's an uphill battle.
Idk who told conservatives about libraries but if we had just kept quiet about them they never would have even realized they still existed.
Now they are complaining about libraries having books in them. They won't be happy until they are empty concrete rooms. Such a pitiful shame they can't see the objective value of libraries.
Cletus does sound similar to something they can't find. Maybe we should rename libraries after him.
You're more right than you may know. Conservatives in Houston are forcing several schools to convert their libraries into basically just detention halls.
The war with the Nazis only delayed the US's decline into fascism. People crave simple solutions where they can just blink and their problems are gone, fascism promises simple but false solutions.
While I’m also outraged at every one of these book banning stories, remember that each one is one library in one state (except Florida, may their uneducated asses rot in the swamp of malicious ignorance) in a huge country
yes, LGBTQ+ is a problem, indeed. not the fact to be gay but the lobbying stuff which is out of hands.
What lobbying stuff? Are you under the impression that there's a huge, powerful LGBT+ lobby influencing congress? Because that's nonsense. The two biggest lobbying groups in Washington are the insurance industry and the pharmaceutical industry. Maybe focus on that instead of people who can't help the way they're born.
Are you under the impression that there’s a huge, powerful LGBT+ lobby influencing congress?
Fucking USA is not the center of the world! Give us a break.
Though LGBT+ on the workplace and media are pretty intrusive, yep.
One thing is "banning" and another is deciding what "tax money" buys. You can get any book you want, that is not called banning
So government spending should be based on religious beliefs? Because there is no other reason for banning LGBTQ+ books, you know.
I think the Constitution has a word or two about that.
Yeap, the fed can stop selling guns, no problem. They are not going to takr the guns you own are they? That is what banning would be. Are they caking your books? Nope, just like they are not taking your guns.
so, if I've understood you correctly - once you buy one single gun, there is no need to buy any other gun? nor for anyone else to buy a gun as they could just use your gun?
do you envision it like one gun for the whole country? or per state? would you use like a calendly link to book the gun?
Tha fuck are you talking about? Lol. You can buy as many guys as you want just like you can buy any book as many times as you want. Or sell, just dint foce anybody to buy you book that it would not sell by itself :)
ok, don't force anyone to support a war machine they don't want. don't force anyone to support roads they don't want built. don't force anyone to build hospitals, or fire stations, or schools, or sewers, or cut down trees, or maintain a police force.
what you seem to be missing is that I'm not literally claiming we should actively do things I'm saying
I'm making fun of the ridiculous points by making equally spurious suggestions in the other direction. my intention isn't to convince anyone that my comments are the correct course of action, they are simply mocking the ideas by parroting and rephrasing the sentiment.
Yes you can force the government to stop selling guns bought with tax payers money. What a stupid take.
Not all library funds come from public tax dollars. So, assuming those books are bought with non public funds, what's the gripe there? Or, heck, what if I donate the books?
Or maybe this isn't actually about public funds... Maybe it's one group applying their subjective moral beliefs on another group, then retroactively defending their atrocious behavior as a "public funds" debate.
So you aren't even aware that libraries have book sales to raise funds?
i.e. money that isn't taxpayer money?
Maybe you shouldn't make pronouncements about libraries if you never even set foot in them.
What are you even talking about? You were saying that taxpayer money shouldn't go to LGBT books in libraries if the community doesn't want taxpayer money to go to them. I'm showing you that taxpayer money doesn't have to go to them. So do you still have an issue with libraries buying books that cater to minorities in their community?
I dont understand, like how is the government compelled to break its own laws. Isnt library under free speech. I dont understand how such a failure of our institutions was able to happen.
It’s been a long and protracted fight. The Know Your Enemy podcast is a good place to revisit historical conservatism.
It's a topic I care about so I'll definitely start loading myself up on walking material.
That said, there's over 100 episodes and they're quite lengthy. Are there any episodes that stood out to you?
It'll all come with time, but I'd ideally like to prioritize what you felt had more impact or potential, if you recall at all.
The Rush Limbaugh ep is probably as good a place to start as any. That man had an outsized influence on conservative tactics.
A few things
Some library boards, directors, and even librarians themselves, against all reason, are on the same page as these psychos about banning books. Especially boards.
Millages. Libraries need the approval of the residents in their service area, or they won’t get money and will have to close.
A lot of this is shut down by formal processes. The library I work for has had emails and phone calls about our materials, but zero formal requests to review any specific books. They want to make the noises they need to make to fit in with the culture, but don’t want to actually stick their necks out by doing something like filing paperwork with their name on it.
It’s a sticky situation, but unless you’re in a deep red area, you’re probably fine. My collections include graphic novels, so I have their main target, Gender Queer, in there, and I haven’t to take any action regarding it being challenged. I’m ready for when I do, though.
Whenever I see people trying to remove books about minorities conservatives hate, I check the catalogue of the library in question.
Sure is funny how often there's a copy of Mein Kampf on the shelves that no conservative ever has any problem with.
The moment you bring up Mein Kampf with these people the 1st amendment suddenly is the most important thing they can think of and can't be amended to exclude anything evil because muh freedums
“Sure, we’re a red community in a red state, but a lot of the people who have real roots here are angry that the library has been attacked.”
Yeah sounds more like a "Leopards ate my face" article than a real news story.
I remember reading a gay coming-of-age book about a young man struggling to find *out who he was, and communicate that to his traditional father.
I'm not even LGBTQ+, but that book was incredible, and I learned a lot from it...
This sucks. I have a spot on my shelf reserved for banned books. Whenever I used to see a new banned book pop up in the news, I’d go grab a copy. It happens so often now I can’t keep up anymore. I hope the librarian lands on their feet maybe moves to an area that appreciates the amazing service they’re providing.
Conservatives have chosen a really sustainable political path with these culture wars: https://www.axios.com/2022/02/17/lgbtq-generation-z-gallup
What's really fucking aggravating is that conservatives will see the increasing percentages of LGBTQ individuals and think children have been indoctrinated, not the reality that more people are finally comfortable being themselves without the vitriol against them and the consequences of coming out.
You think “sustainable” is in their vocabulary? Under pretty much every aspect, they care about now, period.
Quick, save the kids ! They cannot know how to make babies ! it's not, uh... natural ! or something
Another said Gillette’s library had become an “indoctrination center.”
You know where we can start indoctrination of teens? A place they're guaranteed to go and want to use? Libraries.
That's so stupid. Her soul job is to preserve books and their knowledge, regardless of what is in it. The library is sacred. All these people are just a bunch of controlling beanie babies that can't seem to live in a world that isn't just a giant echo chamber of their beliefs.
