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Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

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Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#111

Post by [deleted] »

slg wrote: post #92
PolygonSheep wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couldn't much the same thing be said about Florida schools "banning" books with so-called "critical race theory" and/or LGBTQ themes? Students aren't going to get expelled for reading these books. Their parents aren't going to be criminally charged for buying them for their kids to take to school and read. Everyone in Florida is welcome to buy as many copies of these "banned" books as they want. The schools in Florid…

>The schools in Florida have just chosen not to buy some books they feel didn't have educational value. So what's all the fuss about? The fuss is about the state deciding what Florida schools can and cannot do. Yes, I think the same concepts apply in Florida, but you are misstating what is happening there. The political wings of the government are making these decisions. I want the experts to make these decisions, th…

[deleted]

Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#112

Post by QuarterReptile »

slg wrote: post #44
dontcare007 wrote: post #34

Where banned=not paid for with public funds. Words have meanings. The books are still available, just not in schools.

I think this is being disingenuous because a library deciding not to buy a book is different than the executive or legislature saying that the library cannot buy a book. You are implying what is happening across the country in conservative states is the former when it is more often the latter. Choice is being removed from the people who run the libraries. They are the people who best know what books their communities…

> They are the people who best know what books their communities want and need, not the politicians.

Possibly they know well what is wanted,but certainly they have no special claim on what is needed.

The librarian works for the library, which is a far cry from being the sole arbiter of what books should be bought with public resources, in much the same way that the commanding officers of all the warships hanging out around Ukraine don't get to decide whether to start shooting or at whom.

Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#113

Post by bigbillheck »

skepticalwaves wrote: post #18
Phithagoras wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> real banned books you almost certainly wouldn't find in a public library Do I dare ask what they are?

Two Hundred Years Together by Alexander Solzhenitsyn

Six hundred and eighty copies on worldcat, including one within 7 miles of me.

Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#114

Post by bigbillheck »

llanowarelves wrote: post #105
rootusrootus wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it banned, or simply not available in typical public libraries because it's in Russian and there is not an English translation? My public library has dozens of books by Solzhenitsyn.

It's banned from being sold on all major bookstores / platforms

Two hundred smackers on Amazon.

Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#115

Post by caslon »

ALittleLight wrote: post #99
paxys wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So then how do you know which one of these it was when you apply your test?

I don't know. I just guess. It's not a completely random guess. Context informs the guess. For example, all the examples they give, and the books I saw when I scrolled through the underlying list their article is based on, seem to be about and banned for having gay sex, sexual abuse of children, sex with children, and racism. If they were equally interested in all banned books I think it would be an odd coincidence f…

Most of the latter... aren't banned? Like, at all. They aren't so popular, but you can definitely find books on chemical synthesis in libraries.

Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#116

Post by klyrs »

chernevik wrote: post #71
klyrs wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In quite a few of the critiques I've read, it's described as a valuable perspective despite the ahistorical bits -- some of which have been corrected. Should the entire project be censored?

It's utter nonsense that hasn't corrected its widely documented errors and omissions. Those "ahistorical bits" include a claim that preservation of slavery was a motivator of the American Revolution. And it is surely odd that an account of American race relations somehow neglects to mention the Civil War. The book shouldn't be censored, but it isn't "history" any more than intelligent design is "science". I suppose a…

> It's utter nonsense that hasn't corrected its widely documented errors and omissions.

This goes far beyond all but the most partisan criticism I've read about the project, and even partisans are mad about the project issuing "silent" corrections without notice so your understanding may be outdated. Regardless, I think that some nuance is warranted here and it sounds like the librarians at BPL agree.

Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#117

Post by robonerd »

klyrs wrote: post #58
dankboys wrote: post #10

Quoted post unavailable.

The librarians I know think that even deliberate misinformation should be properly archived rather than disappeared. If you're experiencing cognitive dissonance here, please examine how the Twitterati and Librarians are different populations with different motivations and value systems.

I think there is probably a distinction between an archivist and a librarian. A librarian I know explained to me that the job of a librarian is to curate a collection of books, not to archive/preserve every book. Librarians frequently throw away old books they feel are no longer worth keeping around (generally due to lack of interest, relevance, etc) and certainly don't seek to acquire as many new books as they can. With the rate of modern publishing, only a tiny fraction of books published will ever end up in public libraries.

If you look around or ask, libraries often have a pile of books that are free to take and keep, and will otherwise be thrown away if nobody wants them. I've gotten a fair few books this way, though I've scarcely read any of them. I use one of them as my mouse pad; Microeconomic Theory by Henderson and Quandt, published in 1958. A true bore, but it has a very nice library binding that works great with laser mice.

Re: Brooklyn Public Library offers access to banned ebooks to teens across the U.S

#119

Post by robonerd »

ALittleLight wrote: post #90
vmception wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so where is a good example of that litmus test being passed, where self published books are also routinely hosted?

I think Library Genesis is an excellent example. As a quick test they host both The Turner Diaries and The 1619 Project. https://libgen.li/ I would believe the people who run libgen if they said they were against book banning - at least until I discovered the books that they did ban, if there are any.

Probably a better test for Library Genesis would be books that are notorious in Russia (whatever those might be, I don't know.) I doubt the Turner Diaries has much notoriety in Russia, due to the language barrier if nothing else.
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