Charles Walsh Says With the ascendancy of the visual media, the Internet and the general decline in reading books as a way of accumulating knowledge, a person would be forgiven for concluding that public libraries are obsolete — bookisaurus outmodicus lumbering off into some dim swamp of pea-brained extinction.
But a trip to any of the area’s libraries quickly puts the lie to that presumption. It’s been a long time since libraries were hushed palaces filled with dusty tomes and dustier minds. Today, libraries buzz and zoom.
- Next Library Director cancels newspaper to protest articles
- Previous CT School board committee votes for book removal
Recent Posts
- Seattle Public Library recovers from ransomware attack, makes moves to strengthen tech security September 6, 2024
- Cybersecurity Pilot Program Launched by FCC to Defend Schools, Libraries September 6, 2024
- The Internet Archive just lost its appeal over ebook lending September 4, 2024
- Record labels forgot these songs existed. One man rescued them August 29, 2024
- Woman makes it her mission to visit RI’s 70 public libraries August 26, 2024
- What Books Last and (Mostly) Don’t Last August 26, 2024
- British Library reveals £400,000 plan to rebuild after “catastrophic” ransomware attack August 23, 2024
Recent Comments
- Examining Arab and Muslim librarians in fiction – Pop Culture Library Review on Librarian Combats Muslim Stereotypes
- St. Paul libraries face moment of reckoning – LISNews – News For Librarians on Secret and mysterious libraries
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Oh please
Defending liberty is not keeping books about onanism on public library shelves, defending liberty is defending all of the freedoms this nation holds dear. Even the freedom to be a whacko Socialist, heck even a whacko Socialist librarian.
I don’t see librarians lining up on the borders to repel invading armies. I don’t see them fighting terrorism, well at least not as a group. I do see them attempting to give aid and comfort to the enemy – collectively and often times individually.
Librarians as defenders of liberty. I’d rather have half a dozen longshoremen and a car full of circus clowns defending liberty than the ALA membership – although a few members in the sane minority of the ALA might be helpful.
What a load of warm fuzzy feel good crap.
Re:Oh please
I don’t see librarians lining up on the borders to repel invading armies. I don’t see them fighting terrorism, well at least not as a group. I do see them attempting to give aid and comfort to the enemy – collectively and often times individually.
Funny, where I currently work, there’s two librarians who’ve served in the armed forces. One is ex-Army and the other is former Air Force. The ex-Army librarian is a WWII vet. Yes he’s still working because he loves the profession.
Then there’s my original library. Let’s see, three former Army, one former Air Force, a Marine (Recondo no less), and an extremely cute whacked out WAC. Of those, about half were combat vets, mostly Vietnam, but one Persian Gulf I.
Were they librarians at the time they served? No. But they are now and they did work to repel invading armies and fight terrorism. And all of them think that the “War on Terror” makes just about as much sense as a “War on Envy” because at no point are we going to be able to say “Yup! We won! Everyone loves us again.”
Perhaps a look around at some of your fellow librarians might change your mind on giving aid and comfort. Supporting the Bush II administration which has been caught in lie after lie after lie and implements laws that would have frightened Orwell is not giving aid and comfort to an enemy. Just like Lewis Black once said, just because someone isn’t for a war doesn’t mean they support the other side.
Re:Oh please
” Just like Lewis Black once said, just because someone isn’t for a war doesn’t mean they support the other side. “
Actually if the other side happens to be shooting at us at the time, that’s exactly what it does mean.
Re:Oh please
It depends on why they are shooting at us. If they are shooting at us because they want to conquer us an dstarted the fight, you’re right. But if they’re shooting at us to defend themselves against an oppressive invader that attacked them first, even though they did nothing to us to provoke the attack, then you’re wrong. And since the facts decisively reveal the latter scenario is what took plave, you are wrong. Entirely.
Re:Oh please
Oh please if you really believe that then go join the leftists. Sorry you already did.
Great you work with veterans, what did you do? Or are you a terrorist supporting Socialist like so many other librarians?
Re:Oh please
How do you presume to know what the hell I “joined”? For you, anyone who disagrees with your politics is a “terrorist.” For you, hence millions of American people are terrorists. In your very little, tiny microscopic subatomic particle of a world, you cannot conceive of anyone who disagrees with you on the Iraqi war as having an affiliation or perspective that rejects both left-wing and right-wing extremism, which to me both represent two different sides of the same coin. Stalin and Hitler are brothers in spirit. To accept one is to accept the other. So you’re more of a commie than you will ever in a milion years recognize. What an irony.
Re:Oh please
So what was it you joined again? How are you fighting terrorism? Does putting a Kerry 2004 bumper sticker and a make love not war bumper sticker on your car fend off Hamas?
Please get a grip on reality.
To set the record straight while all terrorists disagree with my politics, not everyone who disagrees with me is a terrorist. They’re idiots, but not necessarily terrorists.
I think this discussion has already been Godwined so stop bringing up Hitler. To call me a commie is to call Britny Spears talented, it just can never be so, but enjoy your delusions. Oh, try the occasional line or paragraph breaks, it makes it much easier to read your ramblings.
Re:Oh please
“So what was it you joined again? How are you fighting terrorism? Does putting a Kerry 2004 bumper sticker and a make love not war bumper sticker on your car fend off Hamas?”
Hey brudda, since you don’t seem to read my posts too closely or you’re too blinded by your prejudices and bigotry to see clearly, let me me say more directly than before that I’m not a big fan of leftism, and wasn’t a fan of Kerry and have never ever put a bumper sticker on my car, on any of my cars, in my life.
BTW, I do put in line breaks, but for reasons unknown to me this board gloms everything together. Ain’t my fault.
Lefties and righties both are full of rotten baloney about many things. Lefties and righties are correct about many things. I just try to discern my way through the mountains of stuff each side generates to find what’s of value and toss away what isn’t. Unlike you, I don’t need to be in a club (“I’M a conservative, I’M a liberal”) to do this often-onerous task competently.
“Please get a grip on reality.” What reality, your psycho reality? No thanks, you can keep your grip on that.
“To set the record straight while all terrorists disagree with my politics, not everyone who disagrees with me is a terrorist. They’re idiots, but not necessarily terrorists.”
I’m noticing a trend among neo-con posters like you: calling anybody a “terrorist” you would have in the past called a “commie,” a “liberal” (a profanity in some neocon quarters), a “socialist,” etc. This is the strategy they use when it’s just impossible to make the other labels stick on people who just can’t be made to fit it.
I suspect this trend will grow as the debacle in Iraq becomes more evident to the American people and as the deaths mount with no end in sight. Hitler had his Jews as scapegoats for what went wrong in Germany post WWI (tough you don’t like me bringing up his precedent, but a precedent is a precedent), neocons have their “terrorists” amongst us (anybody against the war). Tell us you wouldn’t want Bush to march us off into concentration camps and prisons just because we’re against the war. Then we’ll know for sure you’re not a covert fascist.
Re:Oh please
Covert? No.
I wouldn’t want Bush to march you off into concentration camps and prisons just because we’re against the war. That is the beauty of this country, everyone can be as opinionated, and wrong as they want to be.
I don’t belong to a club, much for the same reasons as Groucho Marx did not. I am afraid there really is not anyone else who shares all of my views, how unfortunate for them.
I am however not a neocon, there is nothing neo about it. I have been conservative since I was in utero. I still call people commies, liberals, socialists, and terrorists. I just call them as I see them. Kim Jong Il probably doesn’t mind being called a commie insofar as he is a Communist so why do you find it offensive? I think commies are deluded idiots who can’t function on their own, but that is just my opinion.
I did however enjoy your debate, thank you. Ya freaking independent thinker.
Re:Oh please
With comments like this, I am surprised anyone spends the time discussing things with you.
Re:Oh please
Great you work with veterans, what did you do? Or are you a terrorist supporting Socialist like so many other librarians?
Wow. How’s about fuck you?
You don’t know a goddamn thing about me and you’re calling me names? How dare you? So let’s hear about your military record. What branch of the military do you serve in? What branch of the military did you serve in? Exactly what war did you fight? What the fuck do you do on a daily basis to fight terrorism? From what I’ve seen, history has always shown us that conservatives are forever keen to go to war, as long as it’s someone else doing the fighting. Much like our current president, who served “honorably” in the Air National Guard and did fuck all while a real war went on in Vietnam.
Basically, if you’re so ready to stand up and fight terrorism, now’s your chance. There’s a recruiting station near you.
Oh and by the way, the terrorists? They’re not socialists. Actually they’re about as far from socialism as you can get. They’re about as socialist as you are open minded.
Funny…
The only thing libraries are good at defending are outdated practices.