EDITORIAL: As book ban bids rise, support our librarians

IT was a little heartbreaking, but not entirely surprising, to read Andy East's reporting in Sunday's edition of The Republic about how our local librarians are holding up while some vocal local culture warriors continue efforts at censorship.

This month, for the first time in 16 years, the Bartholomew County Public Library received requests to reclassify or remove titles. Six requests ask to remove books from the teen section, and multiple requests target the best-selling memoir "Gender Queer." Six of those latter requests sought removal of the book from the library entirely.

"This is definitely a new phenomenon," BCPL director Jason Hatton told East, saying the challenges have been "hurtful" and "frustrating" for him and his staff.

That would be a natural reaction for anyone who has trained to serve the public when their professionalism is attacked.

“...I find it very frustrating that there isn't that trust in us as a library and us as librarians that we're going to be doing the right thing for the community because we are. We care about our community. We love our community.

"... There's just, I would say, low morale, so to speak. It hits home. … We all got into this job to help people, to uplift them, to care for them, and when you're accused of harming them or doing damage to them, it hurts."

This attempted censorship is dangerous stuff, but it's also part of a familiar playbook. The books in question primarily deal with themes of sexuality and/ or LGBTQ content, making these ongoing efforts at censorship an attack by proxy on a population of people who historically have faced discrimination and persecution.

Unnerving as that is, this attempt at censorship is even more than that. It's also part of an ongoing effort to undermine public institutions that inform, educate and serve the public. It's part and parcel of the overheated rhetoric we've seen aimed at school boards and public health officials who simply are trying their best in difficult times. We in the press have been labeled "enemies of the American people" by no less than the former president.

So we can sympathize, and empathize somewhat, with what our librarians are facing. We'd like to say to Hatton and the staff at BCPL that we do know you are doing the right thing for the community, and we do trust the work you do. And let us say we are a better community because of it.

Libraries are public. They serve all. Period.

The American Library Association has steadfastly stood against efforts to ban books, and this is its official position regarding access to library resources and services regardless of sex, gender identity, gender expression, or sexual orientation (with our emphasis added in italics): "The American Library Association stringently and unequivocally maintains that libraries and librarians have an obligation to resist efforts that systematically exclude materials dealing with any subject matter, including sex, gender identity or expression, or sexual orientation. The Association also encourages librarians to proactively support the First Amendment rights of all library users, regardless of sex, sexual orientation, or gender identity or expression."

That's what our librarians have been doing. That's why they deserve the community's support.