Book ban efforts surging in 2022, library association says

NEW YORK — The wave of attempted book banning and restrictions continues to intensify, the American Library Association reported Friday. “We’re seeing that trend continue in 2022, the criticism of books with LGBTQ subject matter,” Caldwell-Jones says, adding that books about racism such as Angie Thomas’ novel “The Hate U Give” also are frequently challenged. A middle school librarian in Denham Springs, Louisiana, has filed a legal complaint against a Facebook page which labeled her a “criminal and a pedophile.” Voters in a western Michigan community, Jamestown Township, backed drastic cuts in the local library over objections to “Gender Queer” and other LGBTQ books. The campaign began with a single complaint about “Gender Queer,” which the library didn’t even stock, and escalated to the point where Glidden feared for her safety. “People were showing up armed at library board meetings.” The executive director of the Virginia Library Association, Lisa R. Varga, says librarians in the state have received threatening emails and have been videotaped on the job, tactics she says that “are not like anything that those who went into this career were expecting to see.” Becky Calzada, library coordinator for the Leander Independent School District in Texas, says she has friends who have left the profession and colleagues who are afraid and “feel threatened.” “I know some worry about promoting Banned Books Week because they might be accused of trying to advance an agenda,” she says.