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Enjoy your exploration him Hell Loen, good morning you too.
How are you doing today?
Speaker 2: Very well?
Speaker 1: I gotta tell you. I can't thank you enough for this.
And the reason why is because my wife is a
retired teacher. I lived and breathed the library. But as
of late we all know why we're not all jumping
in there because I don't want someone to push their
agenda onto us. But this what this documentary does on PBS,
it says, do not ever go in there and judge
the librarian. It's not their fault. And that's what I love.
That's what I picked up on this is that it's
the community that's making the changes. It's not the librarians,
that's correct.
Speaker 3: I'm jumping in here to say what I learned as
a person outside the space and starting to document this
four years ago. These are trained professionals who provide such
an important service to us, and are trained in age
appropriate materials, in representation and all of these amazing things.
And unfortunately, with the escalation of this attack on our
freedom of expression, they have now become the firewall. They
didn't ask to do that. In essence, they are now
these incredible patriots in my mind and heroes of upholding
all the tenets of American democracy and protecting our First
Amendment rights.
Speaker 1: One of the things. And I'm not going to lie
to you. I cried real tears because I'm blessed with
the opportunity to speak with all of these ya authors
that are releasing books right now, and we do talk
about them being banned. They've learned to laugh it off. Yeah,
I just got another stripe on my arm and I go,
how can you be laughing about this? Because there's always
a bookstore? And I went, you're taking them away from
the library. How do you feel about that?
Speaker 4: So I think that is a it's a common mental
mistake that people make when it comes to the idea
that well, these aren't really being banned, they're just being
taken out of school libraries, and so therefore they're still available.
You know, anybody can go to Amazon or a bookstore.
But the thing is that we forget that not everyone
has the same access to resources. While yes, I can
go and purchase you know, the latest dog Man book
for my son on you know, Amazon or you know
bookshop dot org, not every parent has the expendable funds
to do so. And so what we're essentially doing is
furthering the divide when it comes to access to resources
and information, because not only are the libraries the books
on the shelves under attack, the libraries themselves are under attack.
And we are seeing across the country the cutting of
library staff, the elimination of school libraries, and it's it's
really terrible, and even classroom libraries have been under fire
through this.
Speaker 3: I just wanted to jump in and say, it isn't
just the school libraries. You know, four years ago when
I started, one of our libraries said we are the
canaries in the coal mine. This is like a trojan horse.
And she was so right, because here we are four
years later. It's the public libraries, it's the museums, it's
the it's the institutions.
Speaker 2: Of higher learning.
Speaker 3: I just had a conversation lest you think that you know,
these books are safe in the bookstores with the someone
from you know, representing the American Bookseller Association, and there's
fear that there will be censorship in the books in
the independent bookstores themselves. So I don't think it's I
think that we have to question really all these places
in the food chain, if you will, of where our
books land.
Speaker 1: You know, one of the things that I have to
give you, guys, big kudos on is the fact that
you take both sides of the fans. You show us
these books that do have some things in there, and
my wife and I looked at each other, going, WHOA, Well,
I didn't know and so, but then she would say, well,
how do you feel about that? You can't judge another
person's a reason for reading a book. Don't take it
away from them. It's like, no matter how much you
unveiled to me, I believe that people deserve to have
the right to see it.
Speaker 3: Well, it's also built into our constitutional precedence setting legal
cases like Peekoversus Island Treadings which established these things. And
I think what a lot of the public doesn't understand
is there have always been parental rights.
Speaker 2: And I have not met one librarian.
Speaker 3: Who has not who's either said before this there were
almost zero challenges, but there was a process. And now
that process, in that protocol has been brazenly broken of
just taking the books like you know, no due process
and dictating a minority of people are able in a town.
Sometimes it's in Julie's case, you know, one individual who
could dictated what a lot of kids could or couldn't read.
So don't you know it's the parental rights should be flipped.
Speaker 2: Don't tell me what you know. I can, my kids
can have to read.
Speaker 1: Please do not move. There's more with Julie Miller and
Kim Snyder coming up next the name of the documentary
The Librarians from PBS. We are back with Julie Miller
and Kim Snyder. You know one of the things that
my Wipe the school teacher, brought up and I thought,
my god, that's exactly why you're a school teacher. She said,
well what about the dictionary? And she goes, you're a guy.
As a little boy, you would look up words in
that dictionary and giggle. She's right, there's stuff in that dictionary.
Do they get to stay?
Speaker 4: So, actually, dictionaries have been challenged, Wow, in different districts.
It's not new. That did happen previously. I probably in
the eighties or nineties, I don't remember the exactly, but yeah,
parents being upset that their child looked up definitions of
dirty words. But yeah, it's it's the thing is that
when we are talking about opening the door to censorship, like,
where does that take us? Because that's that's actual information. Dictionaries,
books that deal with comprehensive sexual education, which is often
in school's like mine, not even taught in schools anymore.
So we're denying students access to information that even its
just about Books about race are under attack here. Books
that deal with the history of racism in our country
are being targeted. Because this is not about inappropriate content.
There isn't pornography in school libraries. By the way, you
can access it on phones, which most of these teens
and preteens have in their pockets. But that's beside the point.
But when it comes to access to materials, this isn't
just about sexual content or what have you. It's about
marginalized people, and it is about like shutting out diversity
of voices, and beyond that, it takes it into freedom
in general, freedom of it expression Because where were the
canaries in the coal mine here? This may have started
with school libraries, but I think anybody could see that
this has gone far beyond libraries, public libraries, bookstores. You know,
we're seeing the creed of infringement on our freedoms.
Speaker 1: And you proved this is not a new millennium thing.
This has been going on all the way back to McCarthyism.
And that's why this documentary is so important because you
don't just say here's what's going on today, No, you
showcase the journey.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, we really I tried as a documentarian to reflect
the journey that I took and to reflect that back
in following an odyssey, if you will, of librarians that
traverse a number of states and even New Jersey up north.
Because less you think this is just happening in Texas
and Florida, we have not played this in one state,
and there have been many where someone hasn't said this
is happening, right, here, So we're hoping people take the
cues from these heroic individuals like Julie and others flanking
them to get involved locally, because censorship is actually something
where the policies are often dictated in very hyper local ways,
So we want people It's not a partisan message. I
don't feel the film is that. I think most Americans
feel that censorship is just fundamentally un American. They know
the dangers of what it's meant in history, and people
should show up and vote in their school board elections,
get involved in the library boards, in local city councils,
and understand what's happening in your community around this issue.
Speaker 1: And it really does filter through everything from pamphlets that
are at businesses. It is being censored as well. Even
as a podcaster, I rely on what I call hidden
speak to make sure that they don't come and shut
my butt down because they well, it's coming, but it
has to start at the library first. But it is coming.
Speaker 2: That's why we say it's a trojan horse.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, wow. Where can people go to find out
more about what you guys are doing? Because this is
an everyday thing. This is why PBS is so brilliant.
In our lives because they make it about our now
and beyond.
Speaker 2: I couldn't agree with you more.
Speaker 3: I couldn't support I've made three films with PBS and
independent lens.
Speaker 2: It's an amazing strand we're so thrilled to be.
Speaker 3: Broadcasting on February ninth.
Speaker 2: On independent lens and YouTube channels.
Speaker 3: And we also have a website, the librariansfilm dot Com,
where people could learn more about our impact campaign and
how we're really creating a movement. I call it Librarians
without Borders. But we have seen this support, as Julie
mentioned earlier, across our borders in Canada and Europe. People
are concerned that we're supporting this, and uh, we're We're
thrilled to be having this tool to organize and get
people involved. Wow.
Speaker 1: Well, please come back to this show anytime in the future.
The door is always going to be open for you.
Speaker 2: We thank you so much for having us.
Speaker 1: You'd be brilliant today.
Speaker 2: Okay, you two, thank you. You did the same