I stumbled across this story and had to use it for my post this week.
To quickly sum up the story, there was a bonfire outside the building which is intended to be used as a new library, with fragments of burned books. Apparently the town has not had a library in years, since the old one had supposedly been ordered closed by the Fundamentalist LDS church president and the books disappeared. The townspeople had started a book drive and had gotten a very generous donation from Barnes and Noble. At the time of this article, it looked as though all that work was wasted.
My first reaction was shock. Here’s a community that is trying to improve itself and provide better for its citizens and someone burns the books? I felt so terrible for the man who owns the building who couldn’t even check to see if there was anything left. The windows had been covered and his key no longer worked.
Then I became very confused and a bit angry when I followed the story to this article: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705371046/Boxes-of-books-feared-burned-in-FLDS-town-recovered-in-Cedar-City.html
Many of the books believed destroyed were found being stored in a nearby town.
Some members of this community were so fearful of outside influences that they were willing to destroy what others had worked so hard for. That’s what made me angry. I wonder if any of the people involved in the burning/hiding were also involved in the efforts to collect the books?
Perhaps even more important... how can these people persuaded that that books are not an evil and that having a town library will only be beneficial?
It is such a shame to hear of books being burnt, especially when people worked hard for donations. Stories like this remind me just how precious is our intellectual freedom. I think we often forget that in the free United States people are still oppressed and their inherent rights are still restricted. I don't know a lot about the FLDS but what I have read in recent years makes it clear that thoughts, ideas or influences outside of what the leaders want taught are not acceptable. A library full of books would be a terrifying idea to those trying to maintain authority and power over what their "followers" think. This incident should act as a reminder to us of the important work we do to protect IF rights of patrons. It could also be instrumental in helping us educate our library users about IF and how every book challenge and banning could possibly lead to the violations presented in this article. I think that parents and community members that challenge books don't realize that what they are doing is the same as burning a pile of books for a library--keeping people from freely accessing information.
ReplyDeleteHow horrible! It is so sad to learn of the links people will go to stop people from learning something different. I hope that they continue with their efforts and the people that burnt these books are brought to justice.
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