There has been an unsettling trend at libraries in the Verde Valley as a small handful of residents have begun harassing or even threatening librarians regarding books and materials inside the library.

American libraries are apolitical and nonpartisan by design. They are repositories of books, reading materials, classical literature, music, newspapers, magazines and other periodicals that can be loaned out to the public as needed. Libraries are community gathering spaces, and, as mostly* government-owned facilities, are open to all members of the community regardless of class, creed, ethnicity, culture or political leaning.

Librarians, as a class, are no more advocates for any particular book, material or theme on a shelf then a dictionarist is a proponent of certain words merely because they appear on a page.

Libraries hold “Mein Kampf,” the “Bhagavad Gita,” the “Federalist Papers,” the “Communist Manifesto,” hundreds of differing translations of the Bible [263 different translations and intrepretations], biographies of both heroes and despots and sci-fi novels of undreamt worlds because there is an interest among readers in that information, perhaps to study, perhaps to criticize, but overwhelmingly because of mere curiosity.

Those who demand that specific libraries or the Yavapai Library Network as a whole ban, exclude or hide certain books misunderstand the fundamental purpose of a library.

Libraries are not dangerous places full of threatening ideas aiming to destroy our children and our country ⸺ that’s Twitter.

Libraries are not curators of political viewpoints or partisan stances; rather, they are repositories of literature and knowledge. A book or an idea is neither good nor bad.

What a person does with those ideas can be good or bad, but a single book or written text cannot move people so easily. No one text is likely do that to you, because we humans are stubborn things and not prone to making sudden adjustments in our thoughts and ideas. We are slow and plodding when integrating new thoughts into our existing beliefs. There are no courtroom confessions because that’s just not how we are wired.

Books in libraries are written by authors, edited and printed by publishing houses, reviewed and curated and finally requested by libraries and added to their general inventories.

The same cannot be said kind of the content, vitriol, horror and graphic imagery that you can find on your pocket device right now with a few keystrokes, that can be posted by anyone who knows who to upload a video or write a comment.

For those worried about what teens may find in the library, they can find it more easily, more quickly and in more graphic detail on a smartphone that their parents pay for than from a librarian, the Dewey Decimal system and tax dollars.

The last thing we want librarians to do is to censor material. Imagine if your local librarians removed the material you wanted to read. Or if you ask for political tract on the state of America by a leading politician you supported or a religious leader from your faith or denomination and were told, “No, we don’t carry that book, other readers said it was too offensive.”

You would rightly be outraged, as would I and anyone and everyone who believes in the free exchange of ideas, even ideas we disagree with or find repugnant.

Libraries are repositories of our knowledge, our wisdom, our foolishness, our arts, our culture, our beauty, our joys, our hate, our love, our sins and our redemption. Even though most of us don’t like all of the books, all of us like some of the books, so they deserve a place in a library, even if you never read them all.

The American Library Association’s Library Bill of Rights spells out the ethics and principles of public libraries. Note that the Library Bill of Rights was first adopted in June 1939, when books by Jewish and other “undesirable” authors were being banned, then burned in Germany and the formerly free nations the Nazi state had illegally occupied before World War II began — foreshadowing a warning from 1823 by Jewish-German author Heinrich Heine: “Where they burn books, they end up burning people.”

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” is something you can read in a book too: George Santayana’s “The Life of Reason, Volume 1.”

If you don’t like a book, don’t read it, or better yet, read it and tell others why it’s bad with specifics and details.

But leave the librarians alone; they have enough to do in giving us a space to be curious about our world.

* Every library in the Verde Valley is owned, funded and managed by the relevant municipal government except the Sedona Public Library, which is a nonprofit organization, though it receives funds from the city of Sedona and Coconino County and some funds from Yavapai County.

American Library Association’s Bill of Rights

The American Library Association affirms that all libraries are forums for information and ideas, and that the following basic policies should guide their services.

I. Books and other library resources should be provided for the interest, information, and enlightenment of all people of the community the library serves. Materials should not be excluded because of the origin, background, or views of those contributing to their creation.

II. Libraries should provide materials and information presenting all points of view on current and historical issues. Materials should not be proscribed or removed because of partisan or doctrinal disapproval.

III. Libraries should challenge censorship in the fulfillment of their responsibility to provide information and enlightenment.

IV. Libraries should cooperate with all persons and groups concerned with resisting abridgment of free expression and free access to ideas.

V. A person’s right to use a library should not be denied or abridged because of origin, age, background, or views.

VI. Libraries which make exhibit spaces and meeting rooms available to the public they serve should make such facilities available on an equitable basis, regardless of the beliefs or affiliations of individuals or groups requesting their use.

VII. All people, regardless of origin, age, background, or views, possess a right to privacy and confidentiality in their library use. Libraries should advocate for, educate about, and protect people’s privacy, safeguarding all library use data, including personally identifiable information.

Adopted June 19, 1939, by the ALA Council; amended October 14, 1944; June 18, 1948; February 2, 1961; June 27, 1967; January 23, 1980; January 29, 2019. Inclusion of “age” reaffirmed January 23, 1996.