"Reading builds empathy": The case for saving America's libraries
The American Library Association has a Bill of Rights, adopted on June 19, 1939, as a response to book burnings in Nazi Germany. As director and narrator Dawn Logsdon describes in her documentary “Free for All: The Public Library,” these horrors inspired America's librarians to codify their unifying principles into a document. She adds that their library influences them as “a faith-filled family that’s always looking to learn and explore.” “If you don’t have good information,” Kirchberg adds, “there’s no way you can make good decisions.” “Article III: Libraries should challenge censorship in the fulfillment of their responsibility to provide information and enlightenment.” “Article IV: Libraries should cooperate with all persons and groups concerned with resisting abridgment of free expression and free access to ideas.” Webster Free Circulating Library staff circa 1904 Trump’s March 14 order also calls for the elimination of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in the Smithsonian Institution, which was further targeted in another executive order signed on Thursday, March 27, titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” An accompanying fact sheet directs Vice President JD Vance, a member of the Smithsonian Board of Regents, “to work to eliminate improper, divisive, or anti-American ideology” from the Smithsonian’s museums, education and research centers and the National Zoo. “But I think many of us had this feeling that we're the canary in the coal mine,” she added, “not only around targeting LGBT and especially trans people, but also starting to target public institutions like libraries and schools to try to defund them.” Chrastka agrees, tracing conservatives’ library vilification back to the classic dog whistles of race and gender, with book bans serving as a proxy for attacking those populations. Libraries should advocate for, educate about, and protect people’s privacy, safeguarding all library use data, including personally identifiable information.” Making a sentimental case for public libraries is easy.
