The Library Bait-and-Switch
- Fred
- 5 days ago
- 4 min read
I hate books.
I don't mean we should ban them, I hate to read them.
You know who loves books? My Mom. She worked at the local library for 25 years. She loved to read them, she loved the library.
But I'll tell you what, the library my Mom started to work for was a romanticized home of free speech. The library my Mom retired from was a village.
What do I mean by that? Over the years, the library got rid of a ton of books. The library became a meeting place. Books were de-emphasized, they tore out rack after rack of books and put in computers and meeting spaces.
The argument was that a lot of literature was still available, the library just had to be more than just about books. I never understood that argument, by definition, books are what makes a library. You could have meeting spaces at the local VFW, Senior Center, or at City Hall.
What I also never understood, until my Mom started to work for the library system, was that there's a 'lifespan' of a book. Some heavily read books only last a few years. Some moderately read books are too damaged to stay on the shelves and are discarded. Some infrequently read books can last for decades, but contain dated information and are sold at Friends of the Library Sales.
In theory, if a local library is a hundred years old, it should be stacked to the rafters with inventory. Very few libraries today operate under that business model. Today there is controlled 'inflow' and 'outflow.' Due to budget cuts, some libraries can afford very few new books. On the other end of the equation, some libraries have to get rid of old books because they don't have enough staff to stock the shelves on a daily basis.
The Library isn't a home for books anymore, it is a "symbolic" home of speech.
When my family moved to North Ridgeville, the Middle School was almost a hundred years old. One of the first civic related duties when moving to my new town was voting for a New Middle School. I still have visions of water damage in almost every section of the Old Middle School, it was time for that building to go and my fellow voters in the community agreed.
After years of construction, I also remember touring the new Middle School, it was beautiful. When the tour got to the "library" I was stunned. There were about 100 books, I was tempted to actually count the number. Three-quarters of the library's square footage area was giant, carpeted steps. The library wasn't piled with books, it was a quiet learning area. It was explained that this was the new model for school libraries.
Why do I keep yammering on about mundane library processes?
Last week at cleveland.com, they lamented "among hundreds of budget revisions unveiled by Ohio House Republicans on Tuesday, would also ban public libraries from placing material related to sexual orientation and gender identity in areas where minors are likely to see them."
They framed the move as one of many "Anti-Transgender" measures instituted at the state level.
About a decade ago, the far-Left began actively attacking libraries over content. Again, in my idyllic vison of the Library, shelves are full and there are annexes specifically for books. There is an army of employees, and a few volunteers, to keep the flow moving. And there's ample copies of Lord of the Flies to satisfy Mrs. Jones' Honors Literature Class. There is room for ALL BOOKS.
But I started reading articles at places like The Daily Beast and Slate, that maybe it was time to retire Lord of the Flies at the local library and it was time to find some "new classics." Nobody was banning books, the Left whispered, it was simply time to 'refresh' inventories for a more enlightened generation. Don't ban Lord of the Flies, they argued, simply don't replace it when its natural lifespan takes its course.
Now the person in charge of acquisitions at the library was in a pickle. In the real world, budget constraints often don't allow for new books and the re-buying of old books. If the library focuses only on the classics, they are accused of being anti-LGBTQ. If they only buy LGBTQ content, they are accused by bibliophiles of forsaking the classics. The Left made the library a battleground in the Culture Wars.
But there's a layer of the argument that I haven't mentioned yet. Whenever the Left or the Right whine that a book has been banned, I find it very disingenuous. Why? Because it's not 1920, I can get any book I want from Amazon in about 5 f@%#ing seconds. If that book isn't at the library, I try a neighboring library. If it's not there, or the wait is too long, I go to the magical internet.
Last year I wrote about how easy it was to get Ted "Unabomber" Kaczynski's Book.
I also wrote how easy it was to find the Marquis de Sade's Book.
Banning anything at a library, in the year 2025, is largely allegorical.
You see that? You can go to your local library, for free. Get a library card, for free. Get online access to one of the 25 websites above, for free. And then read almost any book in the United States, for free.
What is happening in Donald Trump's America is a de-emphasization of certain speeches. Some speech during the Biden Administration was over-emphasized.
That is a different article entirely.
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