I don’t know how to be tactful about this, but….”
When a patron enters your office and begins a sentence like that, you know it’s going to be awkward. The heart jumps, the mind flips through possibilities. Did I inadvertently offend somebody? Have I been doing something wrong for years? Do I smell?
The patron whipped out a book. It was Climate Change: The Facts, edited by Alan Moran. “Why is this in the library?” she asked.
Phew, I don’t smell.
The book, the patron claimed, is a catalog of climate change denial. The patron noted that the publisher, the Institute of Public Affairs, is a notorious right-wing think tank. None of the authors, she contended, are doing research in climate science, and she pointed out that the sources were inbred. “They cite themselves!” she exclaimed. It took about 13 seconds for her to use “crackpot” as an adjective to describe the work.
The patron asked, “Can’t you draw the line somewhere?”
My answer probably wasn’t going to satisfy her. “The book was actually requested,” I said. “We try to get materials that are requested.”
I didn’t know if more explaining would help. “It boils down to freedom of speech,” I said. “Technically, people could find things wrong with thousands of books in the library.”
“So, if somebody wants a Flat Earth Society book, the library would get it?” she asked, disbelievingly.
This answer wasn’t going to help either. “If somebody requested a Flat Earth Society book, it would be treated like any other request.”
A few things are interesting about this case. The upset patron did not fit the oft-stereotyped book challenger who thinks Harry Potter is undermining America’s moral fabric. The book itself did not fit into the “typically challenged” mold. It was not a children’s fiction book. It was adult nonfiction.
This book challenger was a college-educated reader and her criticisms were probably accurate. The book is possibly a who’s who of climate change deniers. It is likely riddled with half-truths and energy-industry propaganda. But a citizen of the community is entitled to read such material.
Here’s the problem with removing such a book from the collection. Just like the library isn’t the Morality Police, the library also isn’t the Fact Police. We provide a variety of materials to the public. In a democratic society, individuals reserve the right to make the choice to read certain materials. A free populace does not need a nanny to dictate morality, nor does it need an academic committee to tell it what is true or not true. People are free to choose and free to think.
If we start removing materials because they are ‘factually inaccurate,’ we will embark on a twisted Soviet-style purge of our treasured collections.
The Fact Police are as dangerous as the Morality Police. If we start removing materials because they are “factually inaccurate,” we will embark on a twisted Soviet-style purge of our treasured collections. The majority of weight loss and diet books would be out. Didn’t lose the guaranteed 10 pounds in a week? Gone. High-quality materials on serious subjects would be endangered. A work on the life of St. Francis of Assisi includes content that defies the laws of physics? Gone. How about a great history tome that contains a minor error? Is the whole book then worthless? There would be no end to the madness.
It is also important to remember that many established and thoroughly accepted ideas change, sometimes dramatically. The concept of plate tectonics was rejected by academia until recently. Astronomers in the first part of the 20th century ridiculed the big bang theory. Jules Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon was science fiction until such a journey actually happened in 1969.
Unless, of course, you believe it was a NASA conspiracy. In which case, we have those books too.
In the very small public library I began my career in it was suggested to me that I purchase books both for and against an argument at the same time. It was the best suggestion I ever received. When a person challenged the content of a book we could immediately tell them that we carried volumes on all sides of an argument.
Doesn’t the library have a “reasonable person” test? A common sense policy? Any set of standards? Meyer says the library books do not need to be factually accurate – I agree but would Meyer display about a book that is blatantly racist and claiming one race to be superior to others? I agree with the patron, “can’t you draw the line somewhere?”
The problem is more exaggerated with the advent of “Google-know” research, it is hard to determine what are facts. The New Yorker magazine has an excellent book review by Jill Leone “After the Fact” about Lynch’s book “The Internet of Us” She quotes Lynch, “without a common background of standards against which we measure what counts as a reliable source of information…and what doesn’t we won’t be able to agree on the facts.” The implications for governments and societies are huge. In fact, Climate Science deniers are harming the entire planet. If libraries about putting junk in their science sections, who can we trust?
Information literacy is needed now more than ever — to know what peer reviewed research is and what it requires, what is a reputable journal, a valuable source, etc.
(Bolded triggers words like “soviet” are not helpful to the argument.)
Either a library is a free marketplace for ideas or it is a crypt for keeping unused books on display for a public that doesn’t want or need them. The author rightly makes a good argument for that concept. That does not mean, however, that any library is obligated to lend credence to misinformation and outright lies. Yes, a climate change denial book is not necessarily a dagger pointed at the heart of the community a library serves. Well… maybe in a coastal community in Florida it is. In fact, an educated person can make a pretty overwhelming case that the science is decided. Climate change denial books are disinformation. The patron in this story has a legitimate complaint. One deserving of a full consideration before offhandedly dismissing it as not compatible with good library practice.
This is an area of collection development that a librarian has to give careful thought to. Many hard to answer questions come to mind. Do you use the author’s argument to add Holocaust denial works to a library? Do you claim legitimate history balances it out in your collection? What about anti vaccination works? Should a library stock materials that could lead to a public health crisis in the community? When exactly does a bad idea die off in the marketplace of ideas? Sometimes it seems like they never do. But you can’t label a book as stupid or dangerous. Even when it is patently obvious that they are. And “teaching the controversy” is often the last defense of those who have all but exhausted any legitimate case for their idea being valid. Should a library be host to ideas that have no real legitimate validity? Hiding behind an anti censorship ideal doesn’t cut it. At least not in every case. And we in the profession all know that.
This will remain a struggle. Selecting works of non fiction to present a balanced collection on controversial topics is a legitimate goal. Ideals of unbiased collection development often push us into areas where we may not personally be comfortable. But that is our burden not necessarily our patrons. In the end when it comes to disinformation on a topic like global climate change it might be best to paraphrase the many jurists in history who sought to balance legal ideals with real world practicality in applying the freedom supporting precepts of the Constitution. The ALA Freedom to Read documents are not a suicide pact.
Just for some background information, I began my career as a librarian at the Center for Environmental Information (CEI), after an eight run as a research toxicologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center and the Syracuse Research Corporation. My interest in data and information studies related to environmental health and toxicology spawned a Master of Library Science Degree from the School of Information Studies (IST) at Syracuse University. My work at CEI had me managing the Acid Rain Information Clearinghouse, a project proposed for CEI as part of my
I have a shelf of books authored by climate deniers and skeptics, and have put them in our collection, with no input to capstone Readings and Research project at IST, and led me directly into that big, complex, and controversial world of global environmental change. I provided the initial design of a current awareness publication, the “Acid Precipitation Digest,” and served as its Content Editor. We launched is sister publication, the “Global Climate Change Digest,” both of which were published by Elsevier Science. My work at CEI was noticed and I was recruited to a position in the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center CDIAC) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) via the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. I was the Task Leader for User Services and the Coordinator of Communications and Outreach for CDIAC, which was funded under the Department of Energy’s Global Climate Change Research Program (GCRP), that was part of the multi-agency U.S. GCRP. I was part of a team at ORNL that brought CDIAC into the family of the World Data Centers (WDCs) with the establishment of the WDC-A (U.S. WDCs) for Atmospheric Trace Gases, and was a Co-Editor for the three print edition of the CDIAC/ORNL document, “Trends: A Compendium of Data on Global Change.”
I do not do cataloging or identifying their origins to the community of skeptics and deniers. There is NO ROOM for censoring books, regardless of personal feelings or leanings on any topic. I have a fairly good grasp on the need for inclusion of verifiable, viable, and quality STEM data, information resources, and literature in library collections of all sizes. I also know of small rural libraries collection development policies are dictated by Conservative local village or town supervisors, whose idea of a good environmental book is one that deals with hunting, fishing and trapping, and have had gift books reluctantly refused by para-professionals who say, “We’d never be allowed to put that book into our collection.” or “I might loose my job, if a took this.”
I also should mention that after seeing the 1996 documentary film, “An Inconvenient Truth” (more than several times, as I took relatives and friends to Rochester, NY’s Little Theater to see it), and filled out a form to be trained by former Vice President, Al Gore, and The Climate Project, to give his slide presentation that was the basis of his award-winning film and book(s) of the same title. I am now a Mentor for Mr. Gore’s nonprofit organization, The Climate Reality Project, and given his programs (update, revised, and renewed in the 10 years, since its first showing) in various forms about 70 times including at least three times for ALA, most recently in 2013 for a REFORMA program at the ALA Annual. In 2010, after the breaking of the “Climategate Scandal” (the theft of 3,000+ emails and documents from the servers of the Climatic Research Unit at the U.K. University of East Anglia, and the subsequent “massaging” of those stolen electronic communications and distortions and smearing of climate researchers in the U.K. and the U.S., who would quickly be exonerated completely), I had scheduled five climate change programs in New York State, whose invitations were abruptly taken back when as few as one (1) parent contacted the teacher(s), principal(s), superintendent(s), and/or the president(s) of the school, demanding that their students not be subjected to the hoax, the fraud, the un-scientific, and the distorted Socialist teachings of Al Gore (as depicted in “An Inconvenient Truth”).
There is a LOT more I could say, but end here by saying that we librarians should and can hold our heads very proud in our understanding of the concepts and the results of censorship, and really do know the differences between good, quality, STEM-based information, regardless of how inconvenient their truth’s may be.
I curate a literature database, SafetyLit. We make a point of including all sides of any issue if the journal article was published in a peer reviewed journal or if the technical report was published by a university or government agency. I believe that it is essential to know what the “other side” puts forward as their findings or argument. Only by knowing this can one develop counter arguments. Only by reading about research methods and findings can one replicate or refute the challenged publication. Mostly, my site is used by policymakers working in small county, local, or state agencies. We receive a lot of traffic from students at community colleges and universities in low and middle income nations. SafetyLit is a free service presented without advertising. We operate with volunteers throughout the world. Although we prominently state that our records are not screened for quality, every week we receive complaints from members of the general public about our giving the wrong people a forum. We don’t pay publishers for the metadata we receive. So, I guess that my position is a little different from a library where books are purchased. We have records that date from the mid-17th century (about risks to farmers, mariners, and miners). Much of the older stuff has been shown to be wrong by more rigerous research and evaluation. Still, I believe that it is good to know how ideas have evolved.
A staple of my job is teaching evaluation skills. Should I spend budget on a book that my patrons will know not to use if they have listened to what I have taught them?