We’ve all seen the numbers. This year alone, between January 1 and August 31, ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom tracked 414 attempts to censor library materials, including 1,128 unique title challenges. Many of the challenged books are for children and teens and share stories by and about the LGBTQ+ and BIPOC communities. Advocacy resources are available, including the Unite Against Book Bans Book Resumes highlighted in a May 2024 blog post. The Office for Intellectual Freedom is ready to help. Our ALSC and the wider library communities are ready to help. But still, this is exhausting. It’s time for a bit of encouragement.
Read more: Book Challenges: A New HopeIn May of 2024, I attended a conference called the Banned Books Symposium. The conference features presentations on banned and challenged books and programming. This year’s event included a library sharing a banned books trading card program, a book challenge simulation done for staff training, protecting LGBTQIA+ picture books, and more. The day ended with a keynote presentation by Jeff Trexler, Interim Director of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund (CBLDF), a nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting free expression and the legal rights of the comics community.
During his presentation, Trexler made a comment that stuck with me. To paraphrase, the reason book banners are working so hard is because we [library advocates] are winning. Did I mention that Trexler is not only the CBLDF interim director, but also a working attorney who traveled to Virginia to defend Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe against an obscenity claim? It seems safe to say he is well informed on what is going on in the world of book challenges and his opinion is based on solid information.
This sentiment was repeated at my library system’s annual meeting in September by a different speaker- ALA Past President, Emily Drabinski. During her keynote address, Drabinski shared her experiences as she traveled the country visiting libraries during her time as ALA president. She said, again paraphrasing, most places she visited were not facing book challenges, though there were a few hotbed areas. In the majority of the county, libraries remain beloved and trusted institutions where people go for valuable resources, and of course, a good read. Library staff are trusted by their community and not considered… well, you know what some people are saying about us.
Does this mean we can sit back and relax, there is nothing to worry about? Unfortunately, no. We still need to rally together, advocate for the first amendment, and fight for the right of every child to see themselves within the pages of a book. However, we can do so with the confidence of being on the team with the upper hand.
Today’s blog post was written by Joanna Goldfarb, Sustainability Innovation Consultant at the Ramapo Catskill Library System on behalf of the ALSC Intellectual Freedom Committee. She can be reached at jgoldfarb@rcls.org.