Despite the protracted caterwauling of a self-selected few, American Libraries has stuck to its guns and will continue to run polls in AL Direct–rumor has it with the encouragement of ALA VIPs.
I feel the same bubble of glee that welled up in me the first time I heard NBC’s Brian Williams scold the gummint for forsaking New Orleans. Journalists with brains and backbone–I must rub my eyes and pinch myself!
In the course of this discussion, ALA Councilor-at-Random Mark Rosensweig dropped what he thought was the ultimate smoking gun: he forwarded the text of an earlier blog post of mine. Alas for Mark, the tide did not turn against me (largely because the discussion wasn’t about me to begin with, and perhaps also because more than one person on Council secretly thinks it’s funny that I refer to ALA’s 365-day-wonder Michael Gorman as “Gumby”). Mark’s post was largely ignored, because–shhhh! Don’t tell–Mark represents the small, dwindling group of “progressives” in ALA who pull their walkers together of an evening to sing the Internationale and groove on the good old days, when men were men and a gulag was something to be proud of.
Over at Editor and Publisher, Shawn Moynihan just went postal over Press Secretary Scott McClellan’s abuse of the execrable expression, “it is what is is,” and that makes for enjoyable reading. But the brandy-and-cigar moment of my day still comes from hearing that dear old American Libraries continues to have the soul of a real publication.
Posted on this day, other years:
- Must-read report from Project Information Literacy - 2009
- LJ on Top Tech Trends: Talk about getting a story wrong - 2007
- Love in any Language - 2007
- Weekly Podcast - 2005
- USA Today Groks Podcasting - 2005
- CIPA Article in First Monday - 2004
- Review: WriteNote - 2004
–not sure if you’ve seen it or not yet, but today’s (2/10) Wall Street Journal has a relevant editorial [“Weekend Journal” section, W11] entitled “Madame Librarian.” It mentions Cuba and also the recent polling dust-up and says, in part: “On Sunday, ALA President Michael Gorman emailed the newsletter’s editor to say that ‘we would be better off without these polls.’ That smells like censorship–from the very same people who bring us ‘Banned Books Week.’ An organization that roars about the chilling effect of Section 215 on library users also looks pretty hypocritical when its own member-readers are discouraged from circulating their opinions openly.
All something to remember in March, or any time the ALA next tells us that, on issues of freedom, librarians know best.”
Apparently, this piece is already out-of-date, since the polls will return…. But the conclusions drawn about the ALA and intellectual freedom are exactly the kind of conclusions many of us have dreaded. The PLG are taking us down a very slippery slope.
I did not respond to either your remarks or Mark’s that were so personal and ugly because they detracted from the main issue. And I still hope the AL staff will make some changes to the poll, since they are obviously continuing on. I would like to see at least an increase in possible answers to questions beyond just “yes” and “no.” I could go into my continuing tirade about the movement in our society towards thinking there are only two views on everything: Yes or No, Red or Blue, Black and White, Flag flying patriot or traitor. Yep, no thought inbetween are possible or valid, or so it seems.