{"id":14405,"date":"2023-06-25T04:16:48","date_gmt":"2023-06-25T09:16:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=14405"},"modified":"2023-06-25T04:16:51","modified_gmt":"2023-06-25T09:16:51","slug":"librarians-train-to-defend-intellectual-freedom-and-fight-book-bans-at-chicago-conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=14405","title":{"rendered":"Librarians train to defend intellectual freedom and fight book bans at Chicago conference"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

School librarian Jamie Gregory has been called a \u201cpedophile\u201d and \u201cgroomer,\u201d bombarded with private messages threatening harm, accused of distributing pornography in schools, and had her personal address posted on social media.
She takes it on the chin.
\u201cI\u2019m just not going to quit. I\u2019m not going to let them call me that, especially when I\u2019ve worked my whole entire life to get to where I am,\u201d said Gregory, who was named the 2022 South Carolina school librarian of the year.
The \u201cshocking\u201d allegations made her think: \u201cMy whole entire adult life, and all of my education and all my work \u2014 what if this is over? I\u2019m not going to let that happen,\u201d Gregory said Saturday to a room packed full of about 100 fellow librarians at a training session on fighting book bans at the American Library Association\u2019s annual meeting in Chicago.
The attendees broke into applause at Gregory\u2019s declaration.
Book bans and how to fight them is a major focus of the this year\u2019s ALA\u2019s conference. \u201cThe world\u2019s largest library event\u201d provides training and education for library professionals, according to the conference website. Librarians may attend sessions, like the one Gregory spoke at, aimed at helping them confidently counter book challenges, fight legislative censorship and ensure the freedom to read.
The ALA conference hosts thousands of librarians, library staff, authors, publishers and educators as several states\u00a0push to restrict access to books\u00a0in schools and libraries \u2014 overwhelmingly those about race, ethnicity and LGBTQ+ topics. The association in March released data showing a\u00a0record 1,269 demands to censor library books\u00a0in the U.S. in 2022, a 20-year high.
\u201cAddressing book censorship and protecting library users\u2019 intellectual freedom, protecting librarians\u2019 ability to provide for information in their communities, is at the forefront of this year\u2019s meeting,\u201d said Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of ALA\u2019s Office for Intellectual Freedom and executive director of the Freedom to Read Foundation.
All day Saturday, attendees are invited to climb atop a giant chair to read their favorite banned book.
Gregory selected \u201c\u00a0Gender Queer,\u201d Maia Kobabe\u2019s autobiographical comic on what it means to be to be nonbinary and asexual \u2014 the source of the firestorm against the school librarian and the most challenged book of 2022, according to the ALA. She also chose \u201cOut of Darkness\u201d by Ashley Hope Perez, a historical fiction novel about an interracial teen romance.
\u201cThis one always makes them crazy,\u201d said Gregory, patting the copy of \u201cGender Queer\u201d and ascending the stepladder to the massive velvet reading chair, books in hand.
Librarians \u201cmake information available to people freely and equitably,\u201d and Gregory said she plans to keep doing that.
\u201cI don\u2019t impose my own personal moral system on students or patrons. They have to have their own, that\u2019s not my job,\u201d she said.
In Gregory\u2019s conservative community in Greenville, South Carolina, the public library board is pushing branches to remove Pride displays. In March, she testified against a bill that would allow parents to\u00a0challenge any educational materials\u00a0they say violate banned teachings around white privilege and implicit bias.
Still, Gregory said she feels the majority of her community supports her, despite the vocal minority.
\u201cI\u2019ve had a lot of people reach out to me who I don\u2019t even know, saying, \u2018We think you do a great job\u2019 \u2014 even parents at the school,\u201d she said.
Parents always have the right to choose what their children read, but they don\u2019t have the right to restrict access for the whole community, said Christine Emeran, director of the Youth Free Expression Program of the National Coalition Against Censorship, a First Amendment advocacy organization.
\u201cYou can\u2019t just concede to demands of a particular group of parents and to censor libraries,\u201d she said.
Emeran, who is scheduled to be featured in a panel discussion called \u201cHelp! They\u2019re coming for our books!\u201d at the conference Sunday, began to notice an increase in book bans starting in 2021, at the beginning of President Joe Biden\u2019s term. She attributed the shift to \u201ca cultural backlash\u201d against changing views on LGBTQ+ issues, women\u2019s rights and the Black Lives Matter movement.
Local libraries are calling in the National Coalition Against Censorship for help now more than ever. In the past, the organization assisted on a few book ban cases per year. \u201cNow we\u2019re getting two or three a week,\u201d Emeran said.
\u201cLibrarians are under pressure and they\u2019re feeling frustrated, discouraged,\u201d said Emeran, who encouraged readers to support local libraries, attend school board meetings and get involved in their communities to protect the right to read.
Groups such as\u00a0Moms for Liberty, No Left Turn in Education and Citizens Defending Freedom have had an outsized effect on what is allowed to be read, she said.
\u201cThe majority may oppose censorship as a whole. But the problem is that the majority are silent,\u201d Emeran said.
Gregory and fellow panelists Lindsey Kimeri, coordinator of library services for Metro Nashville Public Schools, and Chris Chanyasulkit, an elected library trustee in Brookline, Massachusetts, advised attendees on how best to navigate book challenges in their communities.
Attentive faces bent over notebooks followed every word.
\u201cNo more humble brag, no being quiet, no more \u2018be quiet at the libraries,\u2019\u201d Chanyasulkit said. \u201cNot quiet anymore. Now we\u2019re going to talk about how it\u2019s an incredible, game-changing place for communities, because you need to be loud. The others are, and we\u2019re not doing enough.\u201d
Apnews<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

School librarian Jamie Gregory has been called a \u201cpedophile\u201d and \u201cgroomer,\u201d bombarded with private messages threatening harm, accused of distributing pornography in schools, and had her personal address posted on social media.She takes it on the chin.\u201cI\u2019m just not going to quit. I\u2019m not going to let them call me that, especially when I\u2019ve worked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":14406,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[9053,8370,1555,9052],"class_list":["post-14405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-asexual","tag-book-ban","tag-chicago","tag-non-binary-gender"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14405"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14405\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14407,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14405\/revisions\/14407"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}