Parents Protest American Library Association's 'Censorship'

Controversies over books in public libraries -- mostly school libraries -- have been around for decades but a new round of protests by parents is breaking out in Maryland, Virginia, California, Arkansas and other states.

With the introduction of a new genre of literature and the presence of the Internet, this battle has taken some new twists. Moreover, much of the usual propaganda promulgated by the American Library Association (ALA) regarding "censorship" and "book burning" is increasingly falling on deaf ears.

It’s a dirty little secret that the librarians of today are far removed from the prim and proper characterization which for years was part of American lore; today, these professionals -- more precisely, the ALA -- has taken its place among the militant left and has staked out positions well beyond the mainstream.

There are few very libraries today in which I would leave my 13-year-old son unescorted, because, unfortunately, the protection and safety of our children is simply no longer a priority for libraries or for the ALA. That may sound harsh, but it’s true and the shrill cry of censorship one constantly hears emanating from the ALA is really disturbing considering the shocking books they defend.

Unbeknownst to most people, a new wave of literature called "authentic literature" hit our public school libraries over the last few years. The ALA claims such books portray American life and culture in a more realistic fashion. But they don't. These books feature druggies, sex addicts, pedophiles, gang members and others on the fringes of society. Increasingly, this literature is replacing the traditional literature classics, which, in general, promoted mainstream American values or at least didn't undermine them.

The authentic literature books are rife with profanity and are dominated by themes of death, crime, drug addiction, rapes, gang beatings, weird sex, homosexual encounters, and so on. Shockingly, many of them violate state obscenity laws and even school district age appropriate regulations. In my former capacity as Chairman of the California Legislature’s Education Committee, I collected excerpts from hundreds of such books that are not only common in school libraries but are often assigned by teachers as mandatory reading assignments.

Naturally, parent groups have formed to protest such books and many have put up websites with excerpts, but much of it is too graphic for me to repeat here. The best of the parent web sites is www.pabbis.com; take a look and weep. Yes, this is the trash many of our public schools are feeding America’s youth. The books that used to inspire; which celebrated American values; that chronicled the exploits of trailblazers, astronauts, soldiers, and other heroes, are fast disappearing. And their replacements are books like: "A Woman in Heat Wiping Herself," "Outside the Operating Room of a Sex-Change Doctor," and the "Rainbow Boys," a story of three homosexual boys and the various routes they took in "coming out."

The ALA response to parental complaints was the creation a few years ago of a national event they call "Banned Books Week" in which outrageous charges are made about parents supposedly attempting to ban classics like "Huckleberry Finn" and "Of Mice and Men." It’s an ingenious tactic considering the ALA seems intent on phasing out the classics. However, parent researchers and bloggers have found many of these allegations to be false or grossly exaggerated; for example, the ALA counts as censorship incidents in which a parent simply requests that the school or library be more age selective when assigning books or amend a teacher’s mandatory reading list to include other books not so offensive.

For making the modest demand that schools not flood their children’s minds with filth until, for example, the 8th grade, the ALA, PTA, various state Department of Educations and some loony anti-Christian groups have responded by publishing outlandish strategy manuals on how to deal with "extremists," the code word for any parent with a religious-based value system.

But the ALA will not compromise on such common-sense requests by parents. Banned Books Week was clearly designed by the ALA to direct attention away from the onslaught of violent, obscene literature in America's schools. And it's not just books; it's the Internet as well. When I co-sponsored a bill to have filters placed on library computers so as to block pornographic and racist web sites, the ALA went ballistic. They flew in their big guns and in front of a hearing room full of shocked parents, argued that "the First Amendment is more important than parental concerns about content" and made clear they were totally against any effort to block content of any kind from children no matter what age. Indeed, the ALA web site arrogantly states, "Librarians do not serve in loco parentis."

The idea that our Founding Fathers wrote the First Amendment to allow children to view obscene literature is preposterous but the ALA is on a crusade to persuade all libraries to treat children as adults. It’s a bizarre crusade, because, legally and morally, school children are minors and school boards and librarians have been entrusted by parents to protect them from such literature. Indeed, when a library Internet filter bill was introduced in Congress, the ALA went all out to fight it. It passed but ended up in the courts where again, the ALA spent a fortune fighting it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. They lost. Thank God.

A 2000 report by the Family Research Council details how its researchers sent out surveys to every librarian in America asking questions about access to pornography. Despite efforts by the ALA to stop its members from responding, 462 librarians did respond. Their replies revealed 472 instances of children assessing pornography, 962 instances of adults accessing pornography, 106 instances of adults exposing children to pornography, five attempted child molestations, 144 instances of child porn being accessed and 25 instances of library staff being harassed by those viewing pornography. Over 2,062 total porn-related incidents were reported by a mere 4.6% of our nation’s librarians so one can assume the number of incidents is probably twenty times higher.

One would think after a Supreme Court loss and the increasing danger of perverts and pedophiles creeping about libraries, the ALA would shift to more important issues, like helping children learn how to read, but no, the battle promptly shifted back to literature. Indeed, one can make a case that since their hands are now tied regarding Internet porn, ALA members have intensified their efforts to purchase highly inappropriate literature.

The ALA’s bias is so obvious that when parent groups have offered to place books in libraries with conservative themes or are critical of the left, the ALA’s claims of being First Amendment guardians suddenly look fraudulent. When one parent tried to donate George Grant’s book, "Killer Angel," a critical biography of Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger, the library sent a letter stating that "the author's political and social agenda…is not appropriate." Huh? A biographical book with zero profanity is banned but books that feature the "F" word a hundred times are sought after with zeal. Go figure.

Ironically, the biggest censor in America today is currently the ALA. Libraries with limited budgets make decisions every day as to which books to purchase or not to purchase. Such decisions are often based on recommendations from the ALA. With hundreds of thousands of libraries in America today, the purposeful actions of librarians to not select books with a conservative perspective is having an enormous impact on our culture, our value system and our youth. Remember, most teachers get their ideas for student reading assignments from the school library and the ALA targets classroom teachers with press releases promoting certain books.

Nowhere is the ALA's bias more obvious than issues regarding homosexuality. The ALA’s huge Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Round Table works closely with many of the nation's gay activist groups to place into libraries books glorifying the homosexual lifestyle. As a result, one will often find the ratio of pro-homosexual books to books critical of the gay agenda massively in favor of the former. Books by ex-gays are nearly impossible to find. Among the numerous pro-gay workshops at ALA’s annual convention are Building and Promoting GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered) Children's and Young Adult Collections. The homosexual books most heavily promoted by the ALA are those which receive its "Stonewall Award" like, "At Swim," "Two Boys," and "Lawnboy," both replete with pedophilia themes. Nor is it uncommon to find in today's libraries graphic homosexual newspapers rife with obscene personal ads.

It has become increasingly clear that the ALA is really not so much dedicated to defending the First Amendment as it is to challenging America's underlying value system. It’s time to acknowledge that libraries have changed. Those who think their children are safe in libraries today need to know that many of our libraries have been transformed from the caretakers of knowledge to key players in the militant movement to undermine America's Judeo-Christian heritage.

It sounds like the ALA is following the Kinsey strategy.

It is not just books. The library takes care of videos the children are shown. My husband and I just sent this note to the school last month:

The video The History Makers: Leonardo Da Vinci, Renaissance Man to the World (1996) by Madacy Entertainment Group was shown in the 7th grade Social Studies class.

The following are portions of dialog from the video:

....

Background voice: Leonardo Da Vinci has been hailed by history as the most versatile genius ever. He gave the world the picture of the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper. He was also renown in his lifetime as an engineer, architect, mathematician, philosopher, and inventor.

------------

Dr Les Prince, Birmingham University: An illegitimate, left-handed, homosexual, vegetarian. One could say he had all the qualifications for being unconventional in terms of Renaissance Italy right from the word go. The makings of a genius indeed.

....

Having spent our entire lives not knowing that Da Vinci was a homosexual, we were surprised to hear from our 7th grade daughter describing this 'fact' during the Thanksgiving holiday when we asked what she was learning in school. We did a little research and, in fact, while allegations were made during his time, no one knows whether Da Vinci was a homosexual or not. So we are left wondering why a video would be shown to 7th graders describing Da Vinci as a homosexual in the first 2 1/2 minutes of a 45 minute video. Da Vinci was such a great man. It is a shame that something so private and unproven is highlighted in this video and described as a fact. It looks like the makers of this series have an agenda to promote. After viewing this tape, we don't think such an unbalanced documentary has any business in the school system, and we are wondering why this video was viewed as appropriate.

Sadly on the test, when asked to name three facts about Da Vinci, 1/3 of the class listed that he was a homosexual along with his other amazing accomplishments

I was looking for an elementary level biography of George Washington at my local library the other day (think 3rd-5th grade reading level section) where I became unavoidably distracted by a similiarly age-group aimed (40 pages, lots of pics, easy words) biography of Margaret Sanger. It was disturbing to say the least.

I feel bad that I'm not going to be able to give my kids the same unrestrained acess to their local children's library that I had growing up.

When did librarians cross over to the dark side?

Beats me but one of the most vile people I have met locally during elections was a librarian. During a rally and counter rally she walked right up to me and another Army Mom and told us to "defend the war to the dead babies killed by bombings in Iraq". When she was leaving she came up behind me and said "I'm a librarian and we are going to kill the Patriot Act". Most of the Dems at the rally kept their distance and some even waved because we knew each other. This lady came there wanting to fight and argue with people.

Congratuations to PABBIS - Parents Against Bad Books in Schools , for getting a terrific write up about them. As my own citizen's group attempts to enlighten the public about the ALA, it is good to see the ALA is starting to get press willing to expose the truth about it. Plan2Succeed, for example, just had published "Library Doling Out ALA Propaganda," an excellent exposé of ALA propaganda. Amazingly, another letter printed that very day also suffers from the effects of ALA propaganda disease. That appears there as well. See the extensive comments we made to prove this beyond the shadow of a doubt.

Plan2Succeed has noticed the similarity of propaganda technique between what the ALA is doing and what other radical, extremist groups are doing to effect a "conversion of the average American's emotions, mind, and will, through a planned psychological attack, in the form of propaganda fed to the nation via the media." Banned Books week anyone? Here is the propaganda technique clearly laid out for all to see. We are seeing the exact same techniques being used and the exact same effects on the public. We are working on writing something that clearly exposes the ALA's propaganda and its effects and resultant dangers to children in public libraries. When that appears it will be published here:

SafeLibraries.org - Are Children Safe in Public Libraries?

Would anyone care to contribute to our efforts?

We are a small group from Ohio, Grassroots American Values (http://www.plan2succeed.org/grassroots/). Our local Librarians follow the ALA instructions to the letter on how to run circles around concerned parents. The local Library Board members think it is OK to have books on homosexuality available to minors in the Library Children and Young Adult (-minors) Department!

Librarians should be ashamed of belonging to an organization that pushes sexually graphic literature for children! One of the web sites the ALA suggests kids access is the Coalition for Positive Sexuality: http://www.positive.org/. This web site offers information “for teens who are sexually active now or just thinking about having sex.” Some topics include: cock rings, nipple clamps, “play with your own or someone else's ass or vagina, put your fingers, dildoes, vegetables, or buttplugs into them,” “cum on someone's belly.”

That speaks volumes about the ALA --and our librarians! So, next time your kid wants to go to a Public Library alone, think twice...

Below is a must read article that explains how librarians hit the bottom: http://www.fflibraries.org/Basic_Docs/biehle.htm.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.