Head Tale

So I recently got tagged on Twitter by a librarian colleague in Saskatoon (who is both a Mover and a Shaker!) asking if I (and a few other online librarian-types) had any thoughts on the changing view of intellectual freedom within the profession, especially in light of wider changes in society which I took to mean the growing awareness of things that might fit under the general heading of “social justice” – rights for women, minorities, etc. and how these groups are often negatively impacted by the actions, attitudes and decisions of others, intentionally or otherwise.)

Would u choose to exclude something from ur collection becauseit isn't in the spirit of a progressive collection policy? Would u exclude a book by Milo Yiannopolous b/c u feel he's a dangerous voice that shouldn't be in a public library, or include him because of precisely that?

— a cautionary tale (@saskatcheyawn) December 5, 2018

Intellectual freedom is something I feel pretty strongly about and have written extensively on in the past so I admit I get a bit giddy when I have an excuse to explore these issues.

(How big is intellectual freedom to me as a facet of librarianship?  At a meeting of various librarians at RPL a few months ago, we did a warm-up exercise where we all picked which of a list of 10 core library values we thought was most important.  Most picked “Community” which is definitely an important trend in libraryland.  I was the only one who picked “Intellectual Freedom”.  Worse, the manager running the meeting (correctly) said “I know which one you’re going to pick before we even made our choices!”) 😉

Okay, enough preamble – so what’s my take on this question?

First off, I do think there’s a greater awareness among librarians (especially newer and/or younger ones) to be conscious of the impact of certain materials we may add to our collection might have on other groups in society (and really everything we do – from our collections to our programs to our room booking policies to the displays that get put up) and even more of a willingness to proactively attempt to shape collections that reflect what some librarians see as reflecting a more modern/progressive sensibility.

Without a doubt, I think librarians having that increased social awareness is a good thing.  But at the same time, I think if we cross a line into actively censoring avoiding certain authors or ideas just because they don’t match with a particular world view, that’s a very dangerous approach for a whole host of reasons (especially when that worldview usually happens to correspond with the person espousing it.)

(Knowing about the changing tide in society with regards to these issues sometimes makes me feel like a parent yelling at their teenager when Elvis came on the TV in the 1950’s.  Have I become an old codger who’s sticking to my outdated ideas instead of just getting with the times?)

But there are quite a few reasons librarians being more activist in avoiding certain materials/authors makes me nervous:

* The line for what’s acceptable is going to be different for every single librarian and frankly, I don’t think it’s even our job to try to define where that line is. That’s a job for police and the courts and the best line we currently have as a society is “Is it legal?”  So libraries don’t carry hate literature or child pornography or things of that nature.  But everything else should be fair for consideration for inclusion in our collections within our respective collection policies, whether they are materials from the “right” or “left” or anywhere in between.

* This plays into the ongoing debate about whether the library is “neutral” or not.  Of course libraries aren’t neutral because nothing in society is.  But, at the same time, I think it’s one of our greatest strengths that we *aspire* to neutrality and providing information without judgement or bias to everyone who comes in our doors.

* The example given in a subsequent tweet about Milo Yiannopolous and whether libraries should or shouldn’t collect his work because he is a dangerous voice is actually the wrong question to ask in my opinion.  What I would ask is “Are there people in my community who would be interested in reading this book?”  Yes.  Is it my job to assess *why* people want to read it?  No.  Okay, the library should hold it, even if the *librarian* doesn’t personally agree with him or his viewpoints.

* On this point, I often use the analogy of a vegetarian teenager whose only option for a summer job is in a fast food restaurant or a staunch Catholic who works in a drug store that sells condoms and other birth control devices – both of whom shouldn’t allow their personal beliefs to influence their work (or else they should find a different job.)

* (So much of this discussion seems to be about the difference between the librarian as individual and the library as institution – how they are similar and how they are different.)

* Another part of my opposition to shaping our collections with an eye to social justice impacts is my strong belief that it’s better to put ideas, even distasteful or controversial or dangerous ones into the public sphere instead of actively restricting them which just makes it more likely they’ll ferment underground.  On a related note, it’s important to remember that not everyone who borrows Milo or Jordan Peterson or whoever, is reading controversial material is doing so because they agree with it or will be influenced by it.  Some just want to try to understand how a sizeable number of people in our society see the world – and maybe use that reading to formulate ways to change their minds?

I don't work in a library so I have a mostly intellectually-optimistic view but yeah I think things have changed since The Return of Nazis.

— Jessamyn West (@jessamyn) December 5, 2018

* Jessamyn West made a good point in the Twitter thread about how the dynamic has changed since “the return of the Nazis”.  This is very true, especially in the US but  increasingly in Canada, that far-right rhetoric is becoming more mainstream and influencing people to act (and act out) in ways they wouldn’t previously.  This shift almost feels like it forces libraries to take sides (and who wants to side with Nazis?)  But again, if I was Library King of the Universe, there are about a zillion types of books I’d probably not want to include in the public library based on my own personal beliefs and preferences about the negative impact they have on other individuals and groups and society as a whole – everything from  Gwyneth Paltrow claptrap to paranormal bunk to screeds against science in all its forms.  But I still realise that these authors/subjects appeal to many others and again, I don’t feel the library is the place to actively suppress those ideas.

* Libraries should aspire to neutrality but most librarians are decidedly not neutral – somewhere between yoga instructors and union organizers on the left-right spectrum according to one study I read.  But if we also believe the library should be neutral (I’ll note that not everyone in libraryland feels this way), we still have the ability to push back on the harmful, negative stuff in society (neo-Nazis *or* Gwen Paltrow).  I do this via my involvement in politics to my other volunteer activities to the donations I make to protests I attend to even having this personal blog.

But I also take pride in being a good librarian (at least as I define it) by resisting the urge to let my own personal views influence my purchasing decisions.  I did this when I’d buy books arguing against climate change that I personally disagreed with for a library system in rural Saskatchewan and I do it every day at my current job when I lend out books on all matter of controversial topics – whether that’s Milo, Sylvia Browne, or JK Rowling.

* I mention JK Rowling specifically because there are also lots of authors who “the other side” also targets because of witchcraft or sex or drugs or language or whatever and I can see a real risk that if libraries forego their (always with the qualifier: aspiration towards) neutrality, politicians and lawmakers could just as easily make moves to suppress the voices and types of material *they* don’t like and, in the end, those people have a lot more power over the direction of libraries than we do.

* That leads to my final thought on the neutrality thing and how important it is for libraries to not be seen as “taking sides”, even on controversial issues. I said it was one of library’s greatest strengths that we aspire to neutrality, even if we cannot be 100% neutral.  There are many reasons for this but this comes into clearest focus when right-wing politicians attack libraries.  For example, I can imagine the drastic cuts to the Sask libraries a couple years ago going very differently if politicians had been able to promote libraries as promoting a “left wing” agenda instead of what we were rightly regarded as – neutral spaces for education, entertainment and community – including by many of their own supporters.

To put that another way, I firmly believe that the right-wing conservative Sask Party government could give two shits when I, a city-dwelling, outspoken NDP supporter, was attending protests and writing letters during the cuts.  But when conservative family and friends in rural Saskatchewan were doing the same thing, they knew that was their base pushing back and it had a real impact.  (This was also reflected in the negative reaction and drop off in membership the Save Sask Libraries FB group saw when they decided to forego their previous politically neutral stance and endorse a candidate in the most recent NDP Leadership race.  This is also similar to the reaction I got when I started a group called “Sask Mafia” in the very earliest days of FB which also grew to have a large membership.  But then I made the mistake of trying to use the group to promote Ryan Meili during his first NDP leadership bid which, in many ways, became the death knell for a group that had been, up to that point, a great resource for general Sask info and discussion.  In essence some things are meant to be political and some things aren’t but if you have an institution which has preached its neutrality for a hundred years suddenly becoming more activist in its approach, I fear that you end up endangering that very institution.)

* And a final fairly minor point on why I think the idea of librarians proactively avoiding/censoring ideas and authors because of their work is misguided. This is often (but not always) a situation where people with best intentions but no other affiliation with the groups they’re trying to protect acting as if the other group was some Borg-like whole – I mean, Milo Yiannopoulos is both gay and Jewish. I am fairly certain he’s an outlier in his views and writings compared to most people who fall into those groups but who am I was a white middle class person (hey, look, I just described the majority of librarianship!) 😉 to say his books don’t belong in libraries because they may be harmful to…gay and Jewish people?  Fairly presumptuous of me.

So that’s a few of my thoughts which I hope are somewhat coherent.

I think for me, what makes the question interesting is that libraries have some core values which are often in direct conflict – we value freedom of expression and oppose censorship but we also value inclusiveness and diversity.  So how do you square that circle?

(Edit: When I was talking about this once, one librarian colleague said the solution is to always err towards decisions that favour inclusion over exclusion.  Does that work?)

And I think that’s the key to this question – there are numerous things librarians can do to reflect those inclusive values and impact society in positive ways – running inclusive programs (my branch hosted a Drag Queen story time earlier this year that was a first for our system), hire inclusively so that our staff reflect our communities (I’m not positive but am fairly sure I hired the first member of an extremely marginalized group to fill a public service role in RPL history – but I’m quick to note, the person got the job because they were the best qualified and the fact that they helped increase our staff diversity and better reflect our entire community was just a bonus), and provide services that increase equality within society (everything from ensuring people at all income levels can easily get cards, have lots of leeway in waiving fines and, as we recently implemented at my branch, providing a long-overdue (ha!) public phone for anyone to use.)

I think what it comes down to for me is that proposing to develop an approach to collections to minimize (potential) harm to marginalized groups sounds like its a positive but I think it really ends up becoming a negative because it undercuts one of the library’s most important values – freedom of expression.

I want the library to be an agent for positive social change.  But I want them to use positive methods in line with our values and history to do so.

But again, I may be wrong.  (If so, it runs in the family!) 😉