WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.480 --> 00:00:05.919 Hello everyone, and welcome to the nonprofits. The Huntsville Madison County Public Library 2 00:00:05.919 --> 00:00:12.839 in Alabama faced controversy as books with LGBTQ plus themes were flagged for relocation, 3 00:00:13.039 --> 00:00:17.879 including a children's book. The book entitled read Me a Story Stella by Marie 4 00:00:17.960 --> 00:00:22.160 Luis Gay was mistakenly added into a list Excuse me added to a list of 5 00:00:22.199 --> 00:00:28.719 potentially sexually explicit books? Why because the author's last name was Gay. This 6 00:00:28.800 --> 00:00:35.600 incident raised concerns about extremist ideologies infiltrating the community's political milieu and prompted a review 7 00:00:35.679 --> 00:00:41.079 of over two hundred and thirty titles. However, after internal and public criticism, 8 00:00:41.240 --> 00:00:45.799 the process was halted. The hcpl's director, Cindy Hewitt, claimed that 9 00:00:45.840 --> 00:00:51.359 there was never an intention to target the LGBTQ community, but the incident exposed 10 00:00:51.359 --> 00:00:55.840 to the need for clarity and communication regarding book reviews in the library. The 11 00:00:55.880 --> 00:01:02.159 incident highlights the importance of supporting libraries diversity and includes The story was published on 12 00:01:02.359 --> 00:01:07.599 al dot com on October eighth, twenty twenty three. So, thinking about 13 00:01:07.640 --> 00:01:10.959 this story, I'd love to hear everybody's opinion about it. Why don't we 14 00:01:10.959 --> 00:01:15.480 start with Kelly, Oh, okay, I wasn't prepared for we could go 15 00:01:15.519 --> 00:01:18.519 to Phoebe. Actually, if yeah, yeah, go ahead, the one 16 00:01:18.560 --> 00:01:22.719 we've passed, the Phoebe sounds good. Well, people don't realize that banning 17 00:01:22.760 --> 00:01:25.840 books is not really a thing that works in this day and age. People 18 00:01:26.000 --> 00:01:29.400 are aware that, you know, you can buy books, you can borrow 19 00:01:29.400 --> 00:01:33.959 books from friends. That's still a thing. You can go to other libraries. 20 00:01:34.159 --> 00:01:37.480 So if this one library decides to go to band book X, go 21 00:01:37.519 --> 00:01:40.719 to a different library. I mean, we're not in the eighteen fifties, 22 00:01:40.760 --> 00:01:47.719 where you know, paper and bookbinding are technologies that are difficult to get a 23 00:01:47.799 --> 00:01:52.439 skilled workforce to create. I mean, we've got kindle readers, we've got 24 00:01:52.879 --> 00:01:57.439 audio books. I mean, we've got a whole plethora of things where you 25 00:01:57.480 --> 00:02:00.599 can obtain books in multiple formats and you don't have to go down to a 26 00:02:00.680 --> 00:02:05.519 library to go and get your your book of choice. I mean, in 27 00:02:05.560 --> 00:02:08.479 Britain in the nineteen fifties, we decided that we were going to ban some 28 00:02:08.560 --> 00:02:12.479 books. France, on the other hand, decided it wasn't going to bother 29 00:02:12.639 --> 00:02:15.400 So you know what loads of people used to do. You got a ferry 30 00:02:15.400 --> 00:02:17.919 at New Haven, get off the ferry at Diepp, walk to a bookshop, 31 00:02:19.039 --> 00:02:21.960 buy it, put it in a brown paper bag. Women would slip 32 00:02:21.960 --> 00:02:25.280 it in their handbags and then sail back to New Haven from deep with the 33 00:02:25.280 --> 00:02:30.439 book. I mean, you can't suppress these things. I mean there's a 34 00:02:30.520 --> 00:02:35.319 scene in The Man in the High Castle where they had the restricted texts, 35 00:02:35.639 --> 00:02:38.400 which is things like Brave New World by Audience Huxley and stuff like that in 36 00:02:38.479 --> 00:02:44.159 a locked room in like a prison cell type thing where you need permission from 37 00:02:44.639 --> 00:02:47.840 Tokyo to go and get access to these books. And it's just like how 38 00:02:49.560 --> 00:02:53.680 far down the rabbit hole of lunacy we're were going to go? You flagged 39 00:02:53.680 --> 00:02:55.520 a book because it's got the word game it what makes we're going to TV 40 00:02:55.639 --> 00:02:59.919 media. We ban the Finstone because the ending theme says you're going to have 41 00:02:59.919 --> 00:03:07.280 a gay o time Jonathan Ugh oh book anyway. No, the list wasn't 42 00:03:07.280 --> 00:03:13.479 trying to discriminate against LGBTQ people, were they The HCPL should really be ashamed 43 00:03:13.479 --> 00:03:17.000 of themselves. It never crossed their minds when they were using a search program 44 00:03:17.080 --> 00:03:22.319 that was programmed to search for gay in book titles in order to put them 45 00:03:22.360 --> 00:03:23.759 in a booth in the back, in the corner, in the dark, 46 00:03:24.240 --> 00:03:30.800 where they thought that that kind of filthy porno that might mention queer people in 47 00:03:30.960 --> 00:03:37.360 kids books belong. Let's let kids learn about gender and sex on the street 48 00:03:37.560 --> 00:03:40.240 or the schoolyard, the best place for any education, according to my ex 49 00:03:40.280 --> 00:03:46.680 brother in law. But bureautic, bureaucratic response of it was never the intention? 50 00:03:46.000 --> 00:03:50.599 Whose intention? Where did this list come from? Those words ring a 51 00:03:50.639 --> 00:03:55.439 little hollow when you find out that there was this list was produced by a 52 00:03:57.280 --> 00:04:04.280 right wing group and that they were complain about LGBTQA or woke culture and black 53 00:04:04.439 --> 00:04:09.360 history. What happened is they put on a book list and they got caught. 54 00:04:09.479 --> 00:04:13.680 The library was given a list from these people, and it was reviewing 55 00:04:13.719 --> 00:04:17.959 it in doing what librarians do, review books to see if they're appropriate for 56 00:04:18.000 --> 00:04:23.199 their library. That's what librarians do. It would not be a good book 57 00:04:23.240 --> 00:04:29.720 for a library, kind of against Library Association's stance on diversity, and I'll 58 00:04:29.800 --> 00:04:34.120 read it here. The library profession recognizes the critical need for access to library 59 00:04:34.319 --> 00:04:41.120 information and resources, services and technologies by all people, especially those who may 60 00:04:41.160 --> 00:04:46.519 experience language or literacy related barrier, economic distress, cultural or social isolation, 61 00:04:46.759 --> 00:04:53.600 physical or attitudinal barriers, racism, discrimination on the basis of appearance, ethnicity, 62 00:04:53.839 --> 00:04:59.879 immigrant status, religious background, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, 63 00:05:00.240 --> 00:05:03.399 or barriers to equal education, employment, and housing. The problem is 64 00:05:03.439 --> 00:05:11.120 this group wants to ban the ALA as well or have their libraries withdraw from 65 00:05:11.120 --> 00:05:16.519 the ALA because of this statement. So I can't say that Alabama appears like 66 00:05:16.720 --> 00:05:24.839 but okay, they're beginning to look a lot like Florida. So where as 67 00:05:25.000 --> 00:05:30.199 you go, So you better be on your guard your vocab is and charts, 68 00:05:30.560 --> 00:05:38.399 and I don't say gay in school, Kelly, take this before I 69 00:05:38.439 --> 00:05:41.240 start singing game. You know, John, I hate to do this, 70 00:05:41.399 --> 00:05:45.920 but you know what, this book wasn't on a list from a conservative group. 71 00:05:46.079 --> 00:05:50.680 It was a preemptive strike by the library. Executive director of the Library, 72 00:05:50.720 --> 00:05:56.600 Cindy Hewitt, asked the managers of each individual branch of the library to 73 00:05:56.959 --> 00:06:01.040 use keywords to search for books that might be in their branch and to review 74 00:06:01.120 --> 00:06:05.720 those books. And because one of the keywords was gay, this this book 75 00:06:05.800 --> 00:06:11.199 did pop up on one of the lists, so it's not it was. 76 00:06:11.800 --> 00:06:15.439 It was basically the library's own list. But it does go to show you 77 00:06:15.639 --> 00:06:21.959 how out of hand something like this can get. The library director. Executive 78 00:06:21.959 --> 00:06:27.279 Director Cindy Hewitt did say the book was going nowhere. It is not being 79 00:06:27.360 --> 00:06:30.959 taken off the shelf, it's not being moved anywhere, and she has no 80 00:06:30.120 --> 00:06:34.839 plans to remove it from the library. There was a great partial quote by 81 00:06:34.839 --> 00:06:41.319 one of the library managers in the article who said that it was cosmically ironic 82 00:06:41.519 --> 00:06:46.680 that this situation escalated during Banned Book Week. So I thought I'd look into 83 00:06:46.720 --> 00:06:53.560 like banned book requests, And according to the American Library Association, there were 84 00:06:53.720 --> 00:06:59.160 one thousand, two hundred and sixty nine individual requests to banned books in twenty 85 00:06:59.240 --> 00:07:02.800 twenty two, nearly double the seven hundred and twenty nine from the year before. 86 00:07:03.199 --> 00:07:08.959 Many of the requests included multiple titles, and a total of two thousand, 87 00:07:09.120 --> 00:07:14.759 five hundred and seventy one individual books were challenged, up from eighteen hundred 88 00:07:14.800 --> 00:07:17.839 and fifty eight titles in twenty twenty one. So this is like an expanding 89 00:07:17.959 --> 00:07:25.560 problem. And the vast majority of these titles, like eighty five percent of 90 00:07:25.600 --> 00:07:30.839 them involved members of the LGBT community or people of color, so there is 91 00:07:31.000 --> 00:07:36.959 definitely a bias here and nearly forty percent of the request to ban a book 92 00:07:38.199 --> 00:07:43.639 were part of a list of one hundred or more books in the same request. 93 00:07:43.879 --> 00:07:46.360 It's not some little thing started by a couple of crazy moms at your 94 00:07:46.360 --> 00:07:51.000 school. This is an organized attempt by a very few amount of people to 95 00:07:51.120 --> 00:07:57.560 squash information that a small grid that the same small group of people have been 96 00:07:57.720 --> 00:08:03.839 deemed have deemed unfit for your kids. Not theirs, but your kids. 97 00:08:03.879 --> 00:08:07.759 They want to put their ideals on way you raise your children, and it's 98 00:08:07.839 --> 00:08:11.839 absolutely wrong, Cross Examiner. You want to pick it up from there, 99 00:08:13.040 --> 00:08:16.360 sure, absolutely, I thought, since we are, I totally agree with 100 00:08:16.439 --> 00:08:22.800 you seeing an exponential rise in the actions of these fringe groups to try to 101 00:08:22.839 --> 00:08:24.839 ban books. Moms for Liberty is the main one right now, right that 102 00:08:24.959 --> 00:08:30.000 was started by Florida school officials, three of them. One of them left 103 00:08:30.000 --> 00:08:31.759 when they saw where this was going, but the two are still pushing and 104 00:08:31.799 --> 00:08:37.279 now they have chapters in every state, most counties. Side note but one 105 00:08:37.360 --> 00:08:41.240 up and I think it was an Illinois published a quote from Hitler on their 106 00:08:41.879 --> 00:08:46.519 newsletter. It wasn't an accidental quote. It was literally, he who controls 107 00:08:46.600 --> 00:08:50.519 the youth controls the future, and they printed under it dash Adolf Hitler. 108 00:08:50.600 --> 00:08:52.039 So these are the people that are trying to ban our books. So I 109 00:08:52.080 --> 00:08:56.399 thought for my segment at least first, there's so many things to talk about 110 00:08:56.399 --> 00:09:00.679 here. There's legal issues, there's the lies that Hewittt is telling. I 111 00:09:00.720 --> 00:09:03.919 agree with your analysis there, Kelly, but I think there's some lies that 112 00:09:03.960 --> 00:09:07.039 we can catchure in and then we can look at some modern trends. But 113 00:09:07.080 --> 00:09:09.159 I'm just going to stick for now because I don't want to hog the mic 114 00:09:09.279 --> 00:09:11.600 with just a quick review of what is the law here? Right, No 115 00:09:11.799 --> 00:09:16.480 reporters ever really come out and say, what is the law? What are 116 00:09:16.480 --> 00:09:20.840 we arguing about here? Why can these groups do what they're doing. So 117 00:09:22.080 --> 00:09:24.600 there's three main cases that we have to go over, and we have to 118 00:09:24.639 --> 00:09:28.440 keep in mind that what's at play here is the First Amendment. Right. 119 00:09:28.559 --> 00:09:33.000 The library is a government forum that is selecting speech and at some point banning 120 00:09:33.039 --> 00:09:37.720 that speech once they have it in their collection. So there's a tension between 121 00:09:37.000 --> 00:09:43.720 collection selectivity my library collection, and neutral treatment of speech. So the courts 122 00:09:43.759 --> 00:09:48.960 have had only three cases that have come close to addressing this, and none 123 00:09:48.000 --> 00:09:52.919 of them are definitive. There is no settled law on how to handle these 124 00:09:52.919 --> 00:09:56.720 things. The earliest was called a case called Brown versus Louisiana, very similarly 125 00:09:56.799 --> 00:10:01.960 named to Brown versus Board of Education, about the same thing. Louisiana would 126 00:10:01.039 --> 00:10:05.440 give people library cards, and back then, this was nineteen sixty six, 127 00:10:05.480 --> 00:10:09.320 if you were black, they would stamp the word Negro on it. And 128 00:10:09.360 --> 00:10:13.039 you were allowed to use the blue bookmobile, but not the red bookmobile, 129 00:10:13.240 --> 00:10:16.879 and you couldn't go into the branches, so you had one bookmobile, and 130 00:10:18.279 --> 00:10:20.200 the courts. That was the first time the court said, wait a second, 131 00:10:20.320 --> 00:10:24.559 First Amendment, equal protection all applies to public libraries. That's a no 132 00:10:24.559 --> 00:10:28.080 no. And then we jump forward to nineteen eighty two, which is the 133 00:10:28.080 --> 00:10:31.840 one that's relevant to this case, which is Board of Education versus Pico, 134 00:10:31.240 --> 00:10:37.320 where a board at a school library said that they wanted to ban certain list 135 00:10:37.360 --> 00:10:39.440 of books. There was about nine of them because they were anti American, 136 00:10:39.720 --> 00:10:45.159 anti Christian, and anti Semitic and just playing filthy. So notice how they 137 00:10:45.200 --> 00:10:48.200 steak in that anti Christian as if that's the job of the government. And 138 00:10:50.039 --> 00:10:54.679 there the courts held that they the reason that the school was banning these was 139 00:10:54.759 --> 00:11:01.000 unconstitutional. It violated the First Amendment and Finally, the America Library Association, 140 00:11:01.120 --> 00:11:07.279 I think it was Jonathan who mentioned the ALA and how the Alabama fringe group 141 00:11:07.360 --> 00:11:11.440 wants to have their library withdraw from the ALA. ALA sued the United States 142 00:11:11.440 --> 00:11:15.720 government back in two thousand and three because they passed a law that said, 143 00:11:15.879 --> 00:11:20.039 you can get funding for your libraries, but only if you install these filters 144 00:11:20.039 --> 00:11:24.639 that will filter out certain information, and the ALA stood up to the government 145 00:11:24.679 --> 00:11:28.039 and said, you can't do that. They actually lost that case, but 146 00:11:28.080 --> 00:11:31.919 it was only because the government said, well, if an adult requests that 147 00:11:31.000 --> 00:11:35.240 this filter be removed, you can let them do that, so you can 148 00:11:35.240 --> 00:11:39.480 have unfiltered information. So those that's it, none of them have spoken, 149 00:11:39.799 --> 00:11:43.000 have printed, have formulated any sort of rule. They just say, well, 150 00:11:43.000 --> 00:11:46.279 in this particular case, you can't do that. In that particular case, 151 00:11:46.320 --> 00:11:50.360 you can't do that. So we really need some good cases to go 152 00:11:50.759 --> 00:11:54.679 before the court to really give us a good set of rules here. Generally, 153 00:11:54.720 --> 00:11:58.559 the courts will say, once a book is in the collection, removing 154 00:11:58.600 --> 00:12:03.799 it becomes a lot harder. That act becomes much more examinable or reviewable by 155 00:12:03.840 --> 00:12:07.080 the courts as a First Amendment problem, and that's what we have here. 156 00:12:07.200 --> 00:12:11.720 So I have a lot more to talk to talk about here on the lies 157 00:12:11.759 --> 00:12:13.639 of Cindy Hewett that we could review, but I thought i'd check in with 158 00:12:15.759 --> 00:12:18.679 the rest of you, like Phoebe, do you have anything else to observe 159 00:12:18.720 --> 00:12:20.799 her? See you bring up the law and you remind me of the provision 160 00:12:20.799 --> 00:12:26.639 of the Patriot Act which said that your library records can be searched, that 161 00:12:26.679 --> 00:12:30.080 you can go and search your library records. And if that isn't one of 162 00:12:30.080 --> 00:12:33.399 the biggest invasions, if your freedom of speed, what books you're taking out 163 00:12:33.399 --> 00:12:37.440 of the library, what books you're reading in your own home, woud you 164 00:12:37.519 --> 00:12:41.559 have taken from a public space funded by public money, and the government saying 165 00:12:41.600 --> 00:12:46.480 that the FBI have the right to go and invade that most precious sanctity of 166 00:12:46.480 --> 00:12:50.600 what's going on in your mind, what information you're putting in your mind, 167 00:12:50.840 --> 00:12:58.840 is something really quite dangerous. And it showed the absurdity of governments and organizations 168 00:13:00.080 --> 00:13:05.440 at all levels trying their very best to regulate libraries in a way which seems 169 00:13:05.480 --> 00:13:09.360 to get to the level of absurdity. Because you used to have the piece 170 00:13:09.360 --> 00:13:13.120 of paper that they'd put up on the side that says that this library has 171 00:13:13.159 --> 00:13:16.879 not been asked for a record's request by the Department of Home led Security. 172 00:13:16.919 --> 00:13:18.759 They couldn't say they had, but they could say they hadn't. And if 173 00:13:18.759 --> 00:13:22.799 that piece of paper disappeared, then they were getting around the lawd because they 174 00:13:22.960 --> 00:13:26.360 weren't telling people they were. But they also weren't any people. They weren't. 175 00:13:26.440 --> 00:13:28.799 Yeah, they put at the bottom of that sign they said, keep 176 00:13:28.799 --> 00:13:33.200 an eye on this sign. Yes, those librarians were sassy. Yeah, 177 00:13:33.279 --> 00:13:35.200 keep an eye on this sign. If this sign disappears, keep an eye 178 00:13:35.399 --> 00:13:39.240 watched this space and things like that, and it goes to show that there 179 00:13:39.320 --> 00:13:43.840 is a very odd relationship that people seem to have with the libraries and library 180 00:13:43.840 --> 00:13:46.159 books. I mean, I remember there was a library that tried to ban 181 00:13:46.360 --> 00:13:52.200 Fahrenheit four fifty one, which is a book about banning books for crime out 182 00:13:52.240 --> 00:13:56.519 cloud. If that doesn't strike you as irony of ironies here we need to 183 00:13:56.799 --> 00:14:01.960 stop what I see as these Neanderthals with narrow minds trying to make us all 184 00:14:01.000 --> 00:14:05.480 into the and of tours with narrow minds again, because this is where these 185 00:14:05.559 --> 00:14:09.960 library bands end up, and we end up with these absurd situations where you 186 00:14:11.120 --> 00:14:16.519 have people deciding what is and is not publicly decent, publicly moral, and 187 00:14:16.600 --> 00:14:20.799 what other people should be putting into their own brain. And I can't see 188 00:14:20.840 --> 00:14:24.840 it as anything other than the least American thing you would ever want to do 189 00:14:26.360 --> 00:14:30.200 is to pry open the trap door of somebody's brain, pee your head in 190 00:14:30.240 --> 00:14:33.200 and go, oh I don't like that. Oh I like that. Oh 191 00:14:33.240 --> 00:14:35.960 you're fine, because that's where it ends up with this nonsense, because you're 192 00:14:35.960 --> 00:14:39.720 saying you can't put this bit of information in, You've got to take this 193 00:14:39.799 --> 00:14:41.879 bit of information in, or you looked at that bit of information, and 194 00:14:43.000 --> 00:14:46.720 it just all spirals out of all control, and it just gets to the 195 00:14:46.720 --> 00:14:50.679 point where it hurts my head ironically, and I just go, why are 196 00:14:50.679 --> 00:14:54.080 we bothering worrying about the little thing? And I'll tell you why, because 197 00:14:54.120 --> 00:14:58.679 if you're worrying about the little things and you push back on the little things, 198 00:14:58.799 --> 00:15:01.159 you stop the America's hop sailing past you when they get away with the 199 00:15:01.200 --> 00:15:07.120 big things. John, I just don't really have an awful lot more to 200 00:15:07.159 --> 00:15:13.679 say about this. I read that somewhere Gilly that that list was provided to 201 00:15:15.320 --> 00:15:22.039 the the the library group there that has I guess ten libraries in its thing 202 00:15:22.159 --> 00:15:26.080 that there was a list provided to them by a group, and I've been 203 00:15:26.120 --> 00:15:31.320 trying to find where it is and can't manage to do that. So I'm 204 00:15:31.360 --> 00:15:35.919 going to retract that statement. But I wasn't trying to get down on you, 205 00:15:35.000 --> 00:15:37.960 John, I was just trying to make you know, get Oh, 206 00:15:39.039 --> 00:15:41.399 that's fine. No, I know what you're trying to do. That's fine. 207 00:15:41.679 --> 00:15:43.240 I'm good with it. But I don't really have to give you a 208 00:15:43.279 --> 00:15:48.519 big electronic cug buddy. I have some information along those lines. If you 209 00:15:48.720 --> 00:15:52.440 like, sure, that'd be fun. But go ahead. Okay. So 210 00:15:52.480 --> 00:15:56.120 the organization you're talking about is an organization called clean Up Alabama. They are 211 00:15:56.159 --> 00:16:00.600 the ones who said we need to withdraw from the alawill. It's point two 212 00:16:00.879 --> 00:16:07.360 of their mission statement. Point two of their mission statements says that we have 213 00:16:07.440 --> 00:16:12.639 to that Alabama should withdraw from the hard left ALA. So that takes it 214 00:16:12.759 --> 00:16:18.679 away from protecting kids from books about sex and puts it into Now, this 215 00:16:18.720 --> 00:16:26.159 is a political suppression of information. And Cindy Hewitt truly did say, Okay, 216 00:16:26.159 --> 00:16:29.360 well, yes, we are aware of Cleanup Alabama. We know they're 217 00:16:29.360 --> 00:16:33.120 coming. Here's where we can we can see what's happening. They publish Clean 218 00:16:33.159 --> 00:16:36.759 Up Alabama. If you go to their website, they have a list of 219 00:16:36.919 --> 00:16:38.960 here's all the books we want banned. So that was out there. So 220 00:16:40.360 --> 00:16:44.279 whether or not Cindy Hewitt admits to it, that list was out there, 221 00:16:44.480 --> 00:16:47.440 they do say that, Hey, we knew this was coming, so we 222 00:16:47.519 --> 00:16:52.200 decided to preemptively start reviewing books. So that's a very sneaky way to say. 223 00:16:52.320 --> 00:16:53.919 No, we didn't use their list at all. It was our own 224 00:16:53.919 --> 00:16:56.360 list. But why were they doing it because of this list? So I 225 00:16:56.360 --> 00:17:00.679 think you're kind of both right on that one. Cindy, if you look 226 00:17:00.679 --> 00:17:03.159 at the record in the story and you look at what she's done, is 227 00:17:03.320 --> 00:17:07.119 not trustworthy. She said, Oh, I only asked my staff to search 228 00:17:07.160 --> 00:17:11.920 for four terms sexuality, gender, sex, and dating. Yet Alex kim 229 00:17:11.000 --> 00:17:15.519 Young, a circulation manager at Madison Branch, said no, this was not 230 00:17:15.640 --> 00:17:21.119 just a mandate of those terms. There were many more turns lesbian, gay, 231 00:17:21.160 --> 00:17:23.200 transgender, and it wasn't just a review. We were told to move 232 00:17:23.240 --> 00:17:26.920 the books, so I think we should can. I haven't seen that Alabama 233 00:17:26.960 --> 00:17:29.759 has followed up on this, but I think that there was a lot of 234 00:17:29.880 --> 00:17:33.759 lying double toot going on the al dot com who ran the story did do 235 00:17:33.799 --> 00:17:37.920 a good analysis and they reviewed all of the books that were affected. They 236 00:17:37.920 --> 00:17:41.400 found that ninety one percent of those titles out of two hundred and thirty three 237 00:17:41.400 --> 00:17:45.240 books, had the words lesbian, gay, transgender, gender identity, or 238 00:17:45.319 --> 00:17:48.160 gender nonconforming in the subject tender. What are the odds that, if you're 239 00:17:48.200 --> 00:17:55.039 trying to protect kids from general sexual information, that ninety one percent of the 240 00:17:55.039 --> 00:18:00.240 books are affected have those keywords in them. Cindy Hewittt is not to be 241 00:18:00.319 --> 00:18:03.559 trusted, She said, this was a miscommunication problem with my you know, 242 00:18:03.640 --> 00:18:07.720 with our program here. So we go back to the old story. Well, 243 00:18:07.880 --> 00:18:11.960 either your lying or your entire staff are incompetent. Which one is it? 244 00:18:12.039 --> 00:18:15.680 So that's the question I would want to ask her. I want to 245 00:18:15.759 --> 00:18:22.119 end this on a quote from ALA President Lesa Paleo Lozada. Everyday, professional 246 00:18:22.160 --> 00:18:26.799 librarians sit down with parents that thoughtfully determine what reading material is best suited for 247 00:18:26.839 --> 00:18:32.920 their child's needs. Now, many library workers face threats to their employment, 248 00:18:33.119 --> 00:18:37.839 their personal safety, their lives, and in some cases, threats of prosecution 249 00:18:38.119 --> 00:18:44.160 for providing books to youth they and their parents want to read. What kind 250 00:18:44.200 --> 00:18:51.480 of world are we living in when librarians become the frontline troops, almost literally, 251 00:18:51.799 --> 00:18:55.279 in a culture war. I get that they do, and they should 252 00:18:55.359 --> 00:18:59.400 stand up for freedom and of information. I'm all tongue types. I'm really 253 00:18:59.480 --> 00:19:04.880 emotional about this, but where in a librarian's job description is putting their lives 254 00:19:04.920 --> 00:19:10.039 on the line at I'm really pissed off about this, and it's something we 255 00:19:10.039 --> 00:19:12.640 should all be pissed off at and be fighting back against.