Let's Not Panic

Well, right now (November 7, 2024) the Libraries and Librarians Subreddit is a nightmare of political posts, mostly of the sheer panic variety.

I’m not here to tell people how to feel about the election, and I’m not here to predict what’s going to happen, whether things will be better or worse.

What I am going to do is share a thought, and then play it out a bit.

The thought comes from the book World War Z. I know that it might seem a bit silly to share a quote from a zombie book in this context, but WWZ is not so much a Return of the Living Dead with Linnea Quigley dancing nude on top of a gravestone for no real reason. It’s a fairly thoughtful, interesting book about what happens when humanity is faced with a genuine crisis. It feels like what we’d get if there was an actual zombie apocalypse and Ken Burns made a documentary series about it.

The quote is this:

Remember; no matter how desperate the situation seems, time spent thinking clearly is never time wasted.

At the moment, we’re not in a thinking phase, we’re in a feeling phase. And that’s fine, you do what you need to.

When you’re in panic mode, you probably aren’t making your best, most strategic decisions. And if you make bad decisions, you might end up wasting time doing tasks like digitizing your entire collection instead of doing things that might be more effective.

So…let’s maybe discuss some things I think you SHOULD do now as well as some of the suggestions I’m seeing that you should NOT do.

Should Not: Digitizing/Pirating Materials That Will Potentially Be Banned

There are a lot of advocates for this, and, folks, this isn’t the answer.

Even if you’re pretty doom and gloom right now, I don’t think the issue at hand is mass burnings that result in titles completely disappearing from the Earth. In 1924, I suppose this was a vague possibility, but in 2024, it’s not likely.

Especially because the targeted books are not going to be tiny, indie press books that nobody has heard of, of which your library has the only copy, and which is held by only your library. Because it’s only popular-ish books that rise to the level of being banned.

Gender Queer is not going to vanish from the Earth, even if your library’s copy is taken off the shelf. It’s a big seller. It’ll be in bookstores. It’ll be in university libraries. It’s culturally important.

It’ll be online. Coughcough. Sneeze. Hawk Tuah. Uh, Rumpumpumpum?

Look, don’t read this for free if there’s any way for you to check it out from your library or pay for it. I’m not advocating that. In fact, it’s really important that you access it in a legitimate way if you can, because when books like Gender Queer aren’t selling and aren’t being checked out in libraries that have it because people are reading them for free online instead, the case for keeping it on the shelf gets a lot tougher.

Which is why pirating is not the smartest move.

I know that being available here and there doesn’t solve the issue of access for your library’s patrons, but neither does digitizing a material that you currently have in print. Copyright laws will not allow you to distribute a digitized copy of a book, and if the book is to be removed from your collection by law, digitizing it doesn’t really serve as a workaround.

Publishers were pretty tight-fisted about doing online storytimes during GLOBAL PANDEMIC SHUTDOWNS, so I don’t think they’re going to be apt to let you go ahead and throw copyright out the window on this one.

Besides, does your library have a good method of distributing the title, something that makes sure the borrower has a library card in your system, something that makes sure that if you’ve digitized one copy, only one copy goes out at a time?

And I do want you to think about yourself for a moment: If your state makes laws that punish librarians for keeping books on the shelf, AND if you break different laws around copyright, this makes it more difficult for your to defend yourself in court, should it come to that.

We need people who are trying to keep intellectual freedom alive to stay in libraries, not behind bars, and not stuck doing everything they’re told because they’re paying off fines in addition to student loans, and this job is their only lifeline.

I’m all for the occasional disobedience and ignoring of bad laws, but I think that should be done when the outcomes of the lawbreaking are well worth the potential consequences. To me, it doesn’t seem that the juice is worth the squeeze on the digitization/piracy front.

Caveat: Before someone complains, I’m not talking about anything super rare, anything in your archives of local history that may be the only copy. That’s a different discussion. I’m not talking about a possible dystopian future where library shelves are bare. I’m also not talking about a made-up teen who is struggling and a book may save their life. That person might exist. The legal problems DO exist.

We don’t need to play the What If? game all day, let’s focus on stuff that’s useful.

Should: Create a Very Clear, Augmented Book Challenge Process

You’ve got another couple months before the government actually switches over, so now is a good time to make your library’s challenge process very clear, as objective as possible, and to insulate it against possible short-term thinking.

Something unusual and perhaps new I might suggest adding to your process is that, after a two-year period, any books removed from the collection must be reexamined and reevaluated, and they are eligible for reinstatement. This is to ensure that nothing is removed from the collection due to a singular, forceful voice that should not be dominating the conversation, and because we sometimes make decisions in the moment that are not the best decisions for all time. There may be folks who make a decision about a book in 2025 that should not stand for all time, a decision they are making for political reasons, not because removing the title is what’s best for the largest number of people.

I’ve never thought about it this way before, but patrons can usually challenge a book repeatedly, year after year, so why can’t a book also have the same chance to be reinstated?

I might also consider adding, if you don’t have it already, language that says any title that is published by a major publisher, wins a literary award, is part of a curriculum, is recommended by a subject matter expert, or that is requested by a user of your library be eligible for purchase. Work with a legal expert on this one. I am concerned that someone will hit on the idea of stopping the whack-a-mole game of book banning and start censoring library collections at the source, before materials can even hit shelves and prove their worth (or not), so if you can safeguard that part of the process, please consider doing so.

Should Not: Hide Books

I’m not a librarian, but I love libraries. What can we do now? Hide books to save them?

Let’s absolutely not do that.

Books hidden in a bunker function the same way as books that have been banned.

For books to be useFUL, they need to be usABLE, and for us to make the case that a book is necessary and useful, it needs to be checked out once in awhile.

There’s also an issue here where you might be tipping your hand. If there is legal action brought against you, hiding books in a secret cabinet accessed by pushing a button on a Shakespeare bust, though totally awesome, might indicate that you are aware there is a problem with those particular materials.

If nothing else, let’s say it like this: We’re not there yet. Right now, we need to be keeping books available and accessible. We need to treat these materials as though there is nothing wrong with them (which there isn’t).

And if we do get to the point that bands of marauders, Mad Max types, raid libraries and burn books, the librarians of America will have the best access to these books and can pretty easily hide them. I don’t think it’ll come to that, but just to ease the absolute worst fears, I think it’s better reserved as a last-ditch effort as opposed to a pre-emptive action.

Should: Use Your Library

Seriously, check out the books that you are concerned will be removed. Use services that benefit people who are in need. The library being busy is one of the best insulators against losing funding or legal action or lawmakers doing stupid shitty shit.

Seriously, I think lawmakers are often kind of cowardly. I think they talk a great game about “doing what is right,” but will turn on a dime, maybe even a nickel (is that a faster turn because it’s a smaller amount? It’s still a bigger coin…) if it means losing their support. If they get the vibe that coming for the library is career suicide, I suspect they’ll magically find a better way to occupy their time.

Should Not: Be So Certain This Is The Worst Time Ever

We can learn a lot from our colleagues who were in the field during the first and second Bush administrations in the early 2000s. Bush took away many freedoms in the name of national security. When the FBI came to libraries and asked for patron checkout and computer browser histories, librarians quickly realized if they don't retain these records, they can't be compelled to turn them over. Let's put our users first and find creative ways to protect them.

Lots of younger folks probably don’t remember this time and may not appreciate what an issue it was.

It may sound like an easier problem to deal with patron records being something we may have to turn over to the government. At least the books were still on the shelves!

But in some ways, it was more difficult.

Because books remained on the shelves, and because individual patron records were open to scrutiny, the mildly, healthily paranoid among us viewed certain titles as traps. It was possible that an individual, accused of engaging with terrorists, might have their library records pulled, and depending on what they checked out, might be made to seem more guilty.

There were obvious ones like the Quran or bomb-making materials or firearms-related materials. And there were less obvious ways this could go.

Imagine, if you will, a person who considers himself a family man, who checked out a DVD with some fairly explicit sexual content. Let’s just say Return of the Living Dead again.

Very little is as shocking and as titillating to a young boy as a woman who goes by the name “Trash” dancing nude on a grave. It’s left a dent in my world. No wonder it’s in this newsletter twice.

Now, this family man with a taste for the “dance macabre” may or may not be guilty of anything, but this man may not want the items he checked out made available to the general public entered into the public record.

In order to avoid that, this man might have been persuaded to make bad choices. “We can wait for your attorney to get here, but in that time, we would probably have to release this information to the public. I can’t imagine your church would be thrilled.”

The real problem with the Patriot Act, the part I might pose as worse, was that it put the burden on individuals, not the library. Where today’s book-banning laws put the onus on the libraries and librarians (not awesome), the Patriot Act put it on the individuals, and in its own way, acted as a book-ban. Because, see, the only way to be certain that my checkout history wouldn’t be public knowledge would be to not check out anything, or to only check out those items I’m fine with the world knowing about.

Oh, AND, if you had to turn over records, you could not inform the individual whose records were accessed. At least with today’s book bans, we know which books are being banned. We can actually address the problem because we KNOW ABOUT IT.

I’m just going to be blunt with you all: I still think George W. Bush is the worst President of my lifetime. Even though I hear and understand the issues with Trump, he still hasn’t started a war that resulted in the death of over 100,000 people. A war fought over WMDs, none of which existed. What George W. Bush did in response to 9/11 was start a war that has lasted most of my adult life, and he severely damaged the freedoms that law-abiding Americans deserve in the name of stopping terrorism. Which, you know, hasn’t super borne out. There’s a very strong argument to be made that G-Dubs is responsible for a lot of government surveillance of innocents Americans.

I think GWB was the worst President for Americans in terms of loss of liberties, loss of life, and loss of personal privacy. But, hey, that’s me. I gather the zoomers among us like him because he’s a cute old man who shares candy with Michelle Obama.

Anyway, we managed that time, and that was pretty shitty, y’all. We figured out how to figure it out. We can do it again. We will do it again.

Should: Reconsider Your Relationship With ALA

Maybe not today, give them some time, but I do think that ALA needs to make itself more useful, more practical, and should probably be looking at more needs-based services to folks in states where things have the potential to get very, very bad.

Free, high-quality legal services for librarians being personally prosecuted are at the top of my list. Bearing the financial burden of this shit is unreasonable for folks on a librarian salary, and it would be incredibly helpful to have highly competent legal services that are well-versed in dealing with these situations.

I’m very much of the opinion that we need this a lot more than we need the money for honorariums for guest speakers at conferences. I know ALA conferences are money-makers and that’s important, but I’d like to see ALA consider shifting priorities. Besides, half the people who go to these things see it as a free vacation, they don’t give a shit about hearing another celebrity who wrote a children’s picture book tell them how great libraries are. WE KNOW.

If ALA looks the same 18 months from now, I do not know that they’d be an organization I could hang with anymore.

Should Not: Spend Too Much Time Online

When someone complains about Book X’s sex scene, I’ll just say, “Oh, you mean the scene that depicts EXACTLY what Donald Trump did with a porn star?”

I’m not telling you this is something you’re forbidden from doing, or even that you should NEVER do it. We all do it.

But if you’re feeling despondent, I really do think there’s merit to taking some time to be offline.

Look, I know, people don’t want to be “uninformed.” I’d argue that a lot of what’s flying around this first week or so is NOT information, it’s speculation fueled by fear. Legitimate concern in a lot of cases, but still, not information, and definitely not the best framework for decision-making.

Instead of spending time online, spend time with your library’s setup. Comb your library’s policies. Get all them ducks in a row. Do your best to protect everything and everyone you can, on a policy level.

It’s not the most exciting work, but it’s productive, and it’s time well spent.

And, I find that the more time I spend in the real world, the more optimistic I tend to feel. Maybe that’s not true for everyone, but I guess I don’t really go to the grocery store and hear people just shouting out weird political slogans the way I might on the Tweetster.

Should: Advocate Hyperlocally

I don’t mean with politics, I mean HYPER, hyperlocally.

Advocate for your library among your friends and family. Tell them about the great stuff you get and do there. Tell them it’s valuable to you and lots of people like you. Tell them how expensive it’d be to buy 10 new picture books every week.

If your friends and family are of the conservative variety, tell them you want reading selections to be a family decision, not a government decision. Tell them you don’t think government should be taking things off the shelves, tell them that sort of government meddling is government overreaching and telling you how to raise your kids. Tell them it’s not about you wanting your kids to read materials that your family may find offensive, it’s about wanting government to focus on the things they should be doing, not your family morals.

Tell them that you’re an adult, you were raised right, you’re responsible, you work hard, you pay your taxes, and you think you’ve earned the right to pick from a wide variety of library materials, not to have what some stooge thinks is right crammed down your throat.

You don’t have to make it a battleground, you don’t have to fight it out over the dinner table. I think it’s as simple as expressing a difference of opinion: I don’t trust the government to decide what’s right for our family, that’s my job.

Should: Communicate With Your Library Board

Your library board almost certainly has email or a contact form, and you should be using it frequently.

I’m going to make a suggestion here that some of you will not like: I think it’s best to treat library board members with a level of courtesy. You don’t have to respect them, you don’t have to like them, but I can tell you, from experience, that an expletive-laden screed isn’t going to accomplish a damn shitting fuck thing.

As much as it may pain you to acknowledge this, your library’s board members are in the position of power, and I do think you’ll have more success asking them to do the right things than you will calling them names.

I also would like to advocate for you communicating with them BEFORE decisions are made. In other words, asking them to reverse a decision is harder than asking them to consider other factors before making a decision. I think a big problem library boards have is that they make decisions, and they don’t hear a peep during that process, and it’s only after the decision is made that folks come out to explain why the decision was, perhaps, not the correct one.

This doesn’t mean you can’t communicate with them post-decision, but that it’s to your benefit to be on top of what the board is discussing.

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Even just a few days later, the discourse on Reddit has improved, and calmer heads are prevailing.

Sometimes, when something big happens, I think conversations can be dominated by the people they’re always dominated by: The masses who DO care, but don’t have a ton of knowledge in certain areas.

Take your time, do what you have to do to get yourself to the place where you can be thoughtful and effective, and then start thinking strategically.

Just remember what that silly man Mel Brooks’ son said in his zombie novel. Remember that you’re not wasting time if you’re thinking clearly.