Only You Can Prevent Book Burnings

Three mindsets I had to overcome to resist and report censorship in my library.

Forest fire prevention poster (Local Identifier: 95-SB-148) featured in the National Archives blog The Unwritten Record.

I never thought it would happen here.

As an academic librarian, library bans and challenges were always a problem for Other People’s Libraries. I reveled in theoretical discussions about intellectual freedom and censorship, while always quietly relieved to be a safe distance from the frontlines of bans and challenges in school and public libraries.

Then came Campus Pride Month. Within 24 hours of staging a library display featuring LGBTQ+ titles, an anonymous patron response to the prompt on a corresponding engagement board disclosed potential sexual abuse and self-harm. Another response was characterized by library employees as “negative (vulgar sexual activities).”

Rather than follow an established protocol for handling bias incidents in display engagement boards — Document, Report, Erase — library workers removed the dry erase board from the display area.

Then they proceeded to erase and remove engagement boards from other, unrelated displays, including one observing National Nutrition Month featuring the prompt, What’s your favorite healthy snack?

Then they announced a moratorium on all library display engagement boards “until we can evaluate how to adequately respond to anonymous comments.”

The engagement board for National Nutrition Month prior to being censored by library employees.

Once it was clear that the potential disclosure of abuse and self-harm had been reported to relevant wellness services and law enforcement for follow-up, I reflected on the other issue at hand:

Is this a challenge? A ban? Censorship? And if so, should I report it?

Using the American Library Association’s Challenge Support resources page as a guide, I determined that the library’s response to this anonymous posting in a display had devolved from a challenge to a ban to censorship in very short order:

• First, an employee objected to the content of the display engagement board and proposed its removal [challenge]

• Second, the engagement board was removed [ban]

• Third, a decision was made by library staff to remove all library display engagement boards based on concerns about potential future responses [censorship].

But was it worth reporting, or was I making a mountain out of a molehill?

These are the three mindsets I had to overcome to follow-through on reporting the library service challenge to ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom - and why I’m ultimately glad I did.

It’s Preventing Harm

One of the arguments raised in favor of removing the engagement boards is that this prevents harm and ensures the library remains a welcoming space for all patrons.

Harm rhetoric can be challenging to counter. No one wants to be put in the position of advocating for harm.

But no library service or programming endeavor is an invitation for patrons to violate the law, or codes of conduct governing library use. In this case, any harm that occurred was not perpetrated by the library, but by patrons themselves. In the event both comments were the work of trolls, we gave them exactly what they wanted — disproportionate power to control the discursive space by prompting a reactionary removal of engagement boards from library displays.

Don’t feed the trolls.

Furthermore, in the instance of potentially legitimate disclosure of self-harm and abuse, the engagement board facilitated the reporting of harm, rather than harm itself. Removing the engagement board in response stigmatizes the victim, who saw the library as a safe space to issue their cry for help, and forecloses on other patrons’ ability to seek help in the same manner.

To paraphrase intellectual freedom scholar Emily Knox, library workers are not in a position to decide what content is harmful to others. To assume this role perpetuates paternalistic thinking about other people’s capacity to engage with information of their own choosing, and infringes on their intellectual freedom to do so. This is why the ALA recommends against the use of prejudicial labels.

Unless speech is restricted by established legal precedents - as in incitement - libraries must maintain robust protections for freedom of expression.

Censorship itself is harmful, and the harm of censoring otherwise protected speech should always outweigh the impact of the speech itself.

It’s Not a Big Deal

Ok, so a couple of engagement boards were removed from library displays. As our library director asserted (in an effort to characterize my opposition as overreaction), library displays are not an essential service of the library. What’s the big deal?

The same argument can be leveled at any material or service provided by the library — no single book, online resource, program, display, author talk, instruction session, or workspace is an essential service of the library — and this line of thinking exposes all library materials and services to challenges, bans, and censorship.

Censorship in libraries is a big deal. It’s mentioned in the trifecta of professional guidance: the Code of Ethics, Core Values, and Library Bill of Rights. This instance is particularly notable for having occurred in an academic library, and having been initiated by library workers rather than the boogeyman of astroturfed conservative activist organizations. In a world where 82-97% of library challenges are unreported, I wanted this event to be counted.

Silent censorship—censorship that goes unreported—prevents us from understanding the true scope and nature of threats to freedom of expression.

It’s Just Temporary

Another reassurance I received was that the pause on display engagement boards was just temporary. The censorship was characterized as an entirely reasonable response to anonymous comments which raised alarm, and the moratorium was intended to enable us all to catch our collective breath, have a conversation about how to respond to similar incidents in the future, and possibly, eventually, resume display engagement boards. It was I who was being overzealous.

But censorship doesn’t have a time limit.

What is the difference between a temporary restriction on library display engagement boards and a library responding to a challenge directed at one LGBTQ+ title by preemptively removing all similarly controversial titles from its shelves while it reviews the reconsideration request? As PEN America explains (emphasis added),

In some cases, books are removed from shelves pending investigations or reviews, and they may be only temporarily restricted, but their restriction is recorded in the Index as a ban since such restrictions are counter to procedural best practices for book challenges from the American Library Association (ALA) and the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC).

If material is censored at a patron’s point of need, that censorship is not temporary - it’s timeless. Temporary censorship is censorship.

Only You Can Prevent Book Burnings

This experience brought to light a fundamental lack of consideration for, and perhaps familiarity with, foundational professional ethics, core values, and best practices in my library. As someone who is regularly active in intellectual freedom-related professional service and scholarship, I took it for granted that other colleagues had the same knowledge and interest in fundamental tenets of freedom of expression.

Instead, my well-meaning colleagues acted on the false dichotomy of harm reduction versus free thought, erring on the side of what appeared to be the lesser of two evils.

The practical impact of this library censorship incident will, thankfully, be considerably less than deselecting a swath of the collection in response to a book challenge. Nevertheless, when it comes to censorship, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Are you prepared to resist a challenge, ban, or act of censorship in your library? The following resources are a useful starting place for library workers and advocates to protect free expression in libraries:

• American Library Association’s Code of Ethics, Core Values, and Library Bill of Rights

• American Library Association’s Challenge Support guide and Challenge Reporting form

• American Library Association Office of Intellectual Freedom’s Banned and Challenged Books guide and Intellectual Freedom Blog

• Beyond Banned Books: Defending Intellectual Freedom Throughout Your Library, written by former Assistant Director of the American Library Association Office of Intellectual Freedom Kristin Pekoll

Most forest fires don’t begin at the business end of a blowtorch — their origins are far more mundane: a stray ember from a burn pile, the remains of a campfire, a carelessly discarded cigarette butt. They smolder undetected without raising alarm until a dangerous conflagration erupts that takes on a will of its own. That such forest fires are unintended does not mean they were unpreventable.

The same can be said for censorship in libraries. Library workers have grown accustomed to thinking of bans and challenges as the struggles of school and public libraries, and as threats that invade from the outside. But letting down our guard about the potential for censorship from within allows these risks to smolder, until the conditions are just right for them to combust.

Prepare now for the possibility of challenges, bans, and censorship in your library. Through knowledge, policy, advocacy, and best practices, we can reduce the risk of censorship and its harms to free expression and human flourishing. Only you can prevent book burnings.

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