(07:05 am) Luddites and TechSnobs

     By way of Jack comes this bit of ALA presidential elections from Karen Schneider. She makes some good points (especially about SRRT, though keep in mind during her defense of Stripling whose politics are no better then Gorman's) but she starts things out with this statement:

The question I want to tackle is how Michael Gorman got elected. It's not that ALA is filled with idiots. Here's what worked for him:"

     I endorsed (scroll down) Gorman because he was actually willing to say something about the profession and how it could be improved. Schneider's complaints come from some anti-technology comments by Gorman which I've defended before. Her words in support of Stripling amount to sentimental fluff. Not that there isn't occasion for that but in an organization dealing with an age-old profession feel-goodness isn't going to go far in keeping it vital.

     I'm not going to tolerate political activism that has nothing to do with our profession. Those who try and make it part of our profession are idiots. But Schneider is trashing someone because they actually are talking about our profession, just not in a way she likes. Well, too bad. Technology evolves at a rapid rate and the geeks who were praising blogs yesterday are on the podcast bandwagon today. Not everyone is impressed and some just don't care at all. Marginalizing them only works if they are small in numbers. I don't think that's the case.

  (06:58 am) Taking A Beating

     For all the talk about Librarians and stereotypes its rare that I ever hear Libraries get trashed (connection perhaps?). Well, Howie Carr and some callers got in a few digs last night. In some cases justifiably so.

     One lady called to complain that since her town closed the library she can't even use the library services of other communities. That's a no-brainer, you pay to play and the only way the system works is if everybody pays at least a little bit. There's plenty of smaller libraries riding on the resources of larger libraries but they are offering what they can. I am going to start looking at the certification issue and see exactly how the formulas work, because some libraries aren't closing they're just losing enough hours to drop below certification levels and I'm wondering if the formula ever takes into account the up and down budget years we go through.

     The big overall issue was the 2 1/2 overrides (Prop 2 1/2 is a limitation on property taxes and can only be overridden by a town vote). Some towns are going for multiple overrides almost annually. There hasn't been much fiscal restraint. Combine that with some of the larger public libraries that have been built over the past 5-10 years and a lot of the good PR that comes from being the town jewel switches around to looking like the prime target of fiscal irresponsibility. Nevermind that we're the mostly fiscally responsible service offered on either a town or state level.

     Its an easy shot for people to look at the modern library and say "but I got Google!" And the fact is there is a good portion of the public that don't use libraries and feel very comfortable writing us off. I've seen how a strong library can break through such a barrier but its not easy, and not for the faint-of-heart.

Sunday June 5, 2005

  (08:18 pm) More Mail

     I got into the GBLT debate pretty heavily a couple weeks ago and yet again just recently because of lovely headlines like this over at LISNews: The Resurrection of Racism, now Renamed Homophobia. Blake doesn't have the echo chamber he was worried about but he sure does have a whole lotta angry Liberals with their collective head in the sand. Anyways, after the first go around I did get a semi-polite email on the issue but I was too burnt on the topic to bother posting it at the time. Here it is with my comments:

I've been reading the GBLT threads with some interest, but I just wanted to comment on one thing. Same-sex communal restrooms have always been potential sources of iniquity. Just because mixed gender roles are more out in the open now, doesn't mean that untoward, predatory behavior hasn't always been exhibited by a portion of the population. Homosexuality and other minority sexual behaviors have likely existed longer than recorded human history. So there have always been, for example, gay Boy Scout pack leaders or baseball coaches and there have always been practitioners of alternate sexual tendencies in the bathrooms people use daily. I think the result of this "slippery slope" as I saw it referred to in the comments will be a re-examination of the appropriateness of the communal restroom model. And this represents a positive move forward, in my opinion.

[Me: The problem with that paragraph is that we still don't know whether you are comfortable with men using women's bathrooms or not. That there are other dangerous situations in our lives and the lives of children is a given. When such a situation becomes apparent is the time to do something about it. The unknown is not an excuse to allow something that is known.]

Acknowledging that alternate sexualities exist, whether or not you support the active promotion of them, allows for intelligent discourse on dealing with the issues. Putting these discussions out in the open is a good thing. As to whether children are ready to engage those kinds of issues, I'm of mixed mind. I tend to be on the side of introducing ideas to children rather than sheltering them. But there is an appropriate time in life to do so.

[Me: Yes there is an appropriate time to do so and it will probably vary from family to family, but its not for you or I to decide when that is. Please remeber this is not about whether the books are bought but where they are placed.]

I think what bothers me most about the Oklahoma situation is the same thing that always bothers me when ideas and budgets clash: that this seems to be more about politics, politicians and money, then about a discourse of what's really appropriate for kids. I just plain don't like the idea of politicians taking money from libraries in order to run a specific political agenda. Now I say that in full recognition that the funding system for public libraries is in its very essence a political agenda. But it upsets me that this action does not appear to be the result of any conversation between the librarians, who are trained to know about children and the impact of their reading patterns, and the politicians, who have a responsibility to the taxpayers and control of the purse strings. Correct me if I'm wrong about this.

[Me: Emphasis mine. What the heck is that supposed to mean? We are trained to understand the difference between the reading levels of children. We are not shrinks who can understand how each individual child is going to react to a book. The bottom line is the politicians in this case probably see Librarians as being completely oblivious to what is going on around them, which in fact they are. Every time I get into this argument I bring up gay marriage and the current debate going on around the country and the fact that many states have been quick to amend their constitution if they felt it was necessary to prevent such a thing. Yet my fellow Librarians deliberately ignore that argument and try to keep the focus just on the book itself in the hopes of belittling the larger issues. That's irresponsible and unprofessional.]

Anyway, although I admit I have a hard time stomaching a lot of what you've said in the threads on LISNews, I'm glad you're still willing to say it. I think your POV represents more people than the LISNews community is willing to admit.

     Would that the other side was a little more honest. When it gets right down to it the people who are pushing King & King, Heather Has Two Mommies and Daddy's Roommate to be on the regular children's shelves, what they really want is gay marriage (among other things) and this is just one more way of pushing it. And if it seems like 3 titles aren't very many that's only because I do in fact represent a lot more people that the LISNews community and others are willing to admit. If I didn't say anything, if the politicians in OK didn't say anything, I have no doubt the heavily liberal publishers would print titles by the dozen and the heavily liberal librarians would buy them by the thousands. You know, because we're trained to know about children and parents aren't.

  (08:12 pm) Fan Mail

     Haven't gotten one of these in a while:

Fan: subj - For Shame
You are not fit to call yourselves librarians. You should be ashamed of yourselves for your attempts to inject racism, and ignorance into the library system. Your organization is a disgrace to America.

Me: What's a sax player doing reading a librarian website?

Fan: So, you put my email address into a myspace search? Your kind doesn't intimidate me. all conservatives are filthy treasonous cowards controlled by fear. Bring it on, punk.

Me: I googled it tough guy, just curious...

Fan: You talk big. But we both know that conservatives are nothing but cowards. You are scared of the future, but the future is coming anyway. Soon, people like you will be nothing more than a bedtime story to scare children. Keep fighting, you will lose.

Warm fuzzies to you too bud

  (08:05 pm) Life

     What little focus I've managed to pull together through the past week of dreary weather has been on work and piano. I have two lessons left and then I'm done indefinitely. My new teacher had a long commute using time he'd rather spend with family so I can't blame him for that. Since the plan is to be an ALA stalker starting next year this seems like a good time to take end the formal lessons and just explore what I have to date, which is actually quite a bit. This year alone was a crash course in Blues that could last a lifetime.