ALA 2022: Sunday Recap

Back to the missing middle days after skipping to the last day yesterday.

Sunday morning I had the HUGE honor to be invited to the Coretta Scott King Awards Breakfast as a guest of Chronicle Books. I got to sit with the author and illustrator I had the discussion with on Saturday. 

I went to the Newbery and Caldecott Awards dinner a few years back and enjoyed that event, but I will be honest here, this was better. First, they all call it the CSK awards, so I will do that here. Second, the joy and community and speeches were all fantastic. From audience to those on the stage, the enthusiasm and positivity was inspiring. But don't get me wrong, the assembled were all aware of and referred to the very real challenges any and all books representing marginalized perspectives are facing right now. They were honest and understand how bad it is, but they chose to use the breakfast as a time to celebrate their joy and on that particular Sunday morning we ALL needed this.

For a full list of the winners and rather honor books, click here.

They also gave all of us an excellent Discussion Guide. They have not linked to it yet, but they will because you can go here to see all of the previous ones. This page is an EXCELLENT resource.

Especially moving was the oldest son of the recently deceased Floyd Cooper accepting his award as the winning illustrator.

And then two pieces of  big news to mark the end of the event, the CSK Awards are moving from a Committee to a Roundtable. This may sound like semantics to some of you, but under the ALA governance, this change is HUGE. The CSK are now going to stand alone and be able to be about more than just the awards. 

And, a representative from Simon & Schuster and Jason Reynolds came up to announce that they are offering $3,000 grants for librarians of color to attend ALA Annual and the CSK Awards Celebration for at least the next 5 years.

I enjoyed it so much, I may continue to buy my own ticket each year. This is a community I want to be a part of, a community that celebrates diversity and the power of books to do good in the world.

Then I went from the CSK Awards to what was the best panel I attended the entire conference:

Fight Censorship in Your School and Public Library

Booklist editor Heather Booth will be joined by Library Media Specialist Shelly McNerney; Newbery Honor and Stonewall winning author Kyle Lukoff; librarian, author, and founder of "Read Woke," Cicely Lewis; Dr. Emily Knox, associate professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; and Kristin Pekoll, Assistant Director at the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom to discuss the recent wave of censorship attempts across the country and offer advice and support for library professionals facing them directly.

Booth is a long time personal friend, collaborator, and a Booklist colleague. I knew she would be a good  voice on this topic as a former teen and tween librarian, a current Public Library Trustee, and just because I trust her as thoughtful and nuanced person. So I was already excited about what could happen here. I was not disappointed. I will go over some of the specifics, but I want to say up front, that what I most enjoyed about this program was that it tackled the shades of gray. Everyone there has experience and everyone there was willing to discuss things openly and honestly. They were also willing to make the BIG STAND to do things to actively battle the specter of neutrality that is being used against us by those trying to remove titles from our shelves.

Okay now on to the details including some language you can use  in your collection development policies to make them less neutral [bolded below].

Booth opened the conversation between these panelists and the audience by reminding us of a statistic ALA Executive Tracie Hall gave at another panel: The rate of books being banned at this moment is surpassing the rate during the McCarthy era.

Booth then did a visual exercise, asking everyone who had ever dealt with a challenge at their work to stand. Then she asked those who "lost" the challenge to stay standing. There were a handful. Both of those visuals were important for the room to see and to frame our discussions. Before beginning, Booth thanked those final standers for being here in this room and for still fighting. This was also important. They have experienced the worst of this topic but are still trying to fight.

Booth then began her questions by starting with Dr. Knox by saying: When we talk about censorship, it is a wide net. When we have these conversations is it important to adhere to a strict definition and if yes, what?

Knox began by helping us frame what we mean when we talking about challenges and banning. There are 4 Rs that make up the constellation of censorship practices:

• Redaction
• Restriction
• Relocation
• Removal

All are censorship, but most people only consider the 4th R-- removal-- to be censorship. For this reason we have to consider all 4 when we have these discussions.

The bulk of challenges are on books for youth and use words like "harm" as in "this book will cause children harm," but we have to be aware of the potential to cause so much more harm by restricting or relocating these titles. 

McNerney added that from her experience as a high school librarian, that when people say a book causes harm what they mean is that it has ideas different from their own that that the student coming to those ideas will be harmed by this difference. But, McNerney argues, this confusion allows the students a moment of cognitive dissonance, something people experience out in the world all of the time. Learning to interact with new ideas is an important life skill. Also, the books in question are rarely ever a mandatory assignment, so she uses this argument to halt challenges in their tracks.

McNerney also has had success forcing people to articulate what they mean by "harm." The burden is not only on you to defend. They have to be able to articulate why they want it removed-- this gets more discussion later.

Lukoff cautioned that we need to be very careful because all sides say that they are coming from a place of love-- even when they clearly are not-- for example, those who tell hum his books are pronography.

This led to a larger conversation about the non-specific and vague language we have been relying on to defend ourselves and how it allows the other side to gain this massive foothold in censorship. Booth noted that as a Booklist editor they are extremely aware of the fact that those who seek to ban books can use their reviews as "proof." So, they are always being as specific as possible-- not saying something general about the book dealing with "social ills," or "problematic topics." They need to name the issues. They want their reviews to get the books on the shelves and keep them there, not help in getting them removed. Using words in a trusted resource that calls a book "problematic," gives them fuel to ban it, even if those words were there to help.

Dr. Knox also said it is very important to understand that these challenges expose your neighbors for who they truly are-- that they think you are trying to damage their kids' souls. 

She also said-- and this is important-- you need to talk to them about why they want the book removed NOT to agree with them, understand them, or even placate them, but to make them explain. To make them say the hateful things so you know where they stand. Then you can counteract them, both with your policies and to strengthen your policies for further attacks. Without knowing their specifics, you cannot be specific to stop them.

Which led her to talk about policies. [Dr. Knox loves policy.] She reminded us that our policies are there to protect us from litigation. Too often we library workers only see them as something we have to follow. This point that you need them to protect you from litigation is more active. It means you are constantly reviewing them and updating them to make sure they keep protecting ting you. Yo must update your language all the time.

This led Lewis to talk at length about knowing your policies backwards and forwards, stressing that you should not wait for a challenge to be ready for a challenge. She used her own GA state law revisions as an example. She used to be able to handle all challenges, and for the record, she had more from teachers in her school than parents. Now GA law says all challenges go to the Principal. As we all know, administration does not want any controversy, ever. What she fears will happen is that the books will all now be quietly removed-- immediately. And not only will this embolden more people to challenge items, but also there will be no discussion, many won't even know the books are gone, and it could even escalate to administration removing books BEFORE they are challenged to keep it all more quiet. 

She is currently trying to figure out how she is going to handle this new law.

Pekoll stated- not all policy is good policy and people are coming to school and library boards with a desire to change policy. These are the worst intentions. Her advice, and this is among the best, active ways to combat the reality that bad actors are flooding our boards was: Make all new Board members sign something as part of their induction that says that they will follow and adhere to our policies. 

This is HUGE. First, every library has an Intellectual Freedom statement so instead of willfully disregarding policy as soon as they get on the board, if these people pledge to follow and adhere to the organization's policies and they do not, you can impeach them. This means they would have to work to change the policies and not simply start by ignoring them. But this would stop their coming on board and immediately going against IF.

This led back to the point of using the most specific language in policies and a few more things you could do RIGHT now came out:

From McNerney: Remove all instances of the term "age-appropriate" from your collection policy and replace it with "developmentally appropriate." This will stop the "age" based challenges.

And from Dr Knox, and this one is even more important: Remove all instances of the word "balanced." 

She continued, you should replace with the word "representative." You don't need the other side in your library. You  never should have had it but that word "balanced" is being used against us. [In tomorrow report I will talk about how we were told to go even further and add this to your CD policy, "We will not collect titles that promote disinformation." But that's for tomorrow]

Lukoff talked about the harm of "balanced" from his perspective as a trans man and to those he works with. He told the story of how he was an 18 year old working at Barnes & Noble and he actively hid a popular anti LGBTQ book. He knows it is not "right," but not acting was worse. And even recently, he told a young trans kid at another Barnes & Noble who reached out for help about Irreversible Damage [the  anti trans book I use in my training program as well] and told him to hide it. 

Again, this is not ideal. But as he said to all of us: believing that policy will protect you is too much optimism. People are horrible and we cannot trust policy to help us. We need to act! They are already acting. 

Dr. Knox then reminded the group that like the other side is already doing, all of us should seed our Boards with those who will protect IF. For the record, we do this at my library-- actively. There is nothing illegal about this. Don't wait for the bad actors to come, go find allies to run.

Booth asked question: How do we counter the idea that some have, that we are all woke, SJW warriors?

Lukoff: I don't believe neutrality exists. Every choice to add a book to the collection means there is no neutrality. And, he added we should not be adding the books that have the counter opinion to, for example, LGBTQ positivity. He is not worried about the "slippery slope" that some say that we will erase the other side and make collections too woke. He talked about how we have the other side already. We always have. We are trying to make our collections better, more free. In fact, he said until we have it so there is "too much" freedom, this practice is fine.

Booth said, these actions are needed. What can we do to mobilize like the other side? And also, what to do if we get threatened or are afraid of retribution?

Lewis: make sure you yourself are reading woke and providing access first and foremost. Being scared is understandable. When you are a leader in this, you will get attacked, but protest and action is not only out in the streets. Remember this. Having a book club of banned books is activism. Providing books that challenge is activism. Putting up displays is activism. You do not need to be engaged in an argument to be active. Also you won't win. 

Here is some activism that they do at her school. Lewis has encouraged the teachers to participate in "Read Woke" and post the titles and authors of the books that they are reading on a white board hanging on their classroom door. That's it. But here's the thing, kids have come to the library and told Lewis that they see those "Read Woke" boards as a way to identify teachers who are allies, safe places for them to go to talk. That's activism.

Pekoll talked about other ways to be active. You should be thinking more broadly about raising awareness and not only speaking up in relation to challenges. Be a voice all the time- everywhere. The opposition is  already doing that. It is easy to think, well it isn't happening to  me so I don't have the platform to say something. You always do. These groups are talking about the harm and pedophilia, etc.... everywhere they go and yet we aren't talking about our side everywhere. We only engage in the conversation in opposition to them. We need to get our message out all the time as well.

Also, send an email to your  library or  school, thanking them for what they are doing. So thank you for that pride display. Because no one is thanking them or praising them for these displays. They are only getting hate mail to take it down. When that is the only voice it speaks louder than the silence. You email may be the reason a display stays up.

McNerney: Being called a groomer and a pedophile is very scary. There is usually no support from the school or admin when a parent challenges a teen book with, for example, anal sex. First thing she says to do is admit you need help and are uncomfortable even with  how to defend titles. We live in a society that doesn't talk about sex at all, let alone gay sex. She reached out to a sex therapist and works with her regularly to help her articulate to those who want to ban books for being "sexually explicit." She can now  use research and science-- things that do make her comfortable to use as a librarian when making an argument-- to explain why this is not explicit but providing accurate portrayals of sex between two men. She is no longer afraid of being obscene because she has facts and research on her side. She thinks every library should have training from a sex therapist now.

Again, this went back to being specific!.

Booth ended the conversation reminding everyone there to attend their local board meetings-- school and library to be there for support. It helps. And she reminded everyone that they should  consider running for their school or library boards as well. She offered herself and me to answer questions about getting started.

Whew, that was a lot, but  all good. I spent the rest of my day in the exhibit hall supporting Summer Scares authors Clay McLeod Chapman and Gabino Iglesias as they did signings for their new books, visiting a few vendors for my library, and stopping by booths in the exhibit hall. Here are some pictures, which if you click will go to the tweets.

I also attended : ALMA’s Library Family Feud Sponsored by LibraryReads, 1:30pm Marriott Marquis Monument. This was a game of Family Feud with librarians against authors and while it was fun, it also raised money for charity. Tweet and picture by my friend and colleague Alene:

And that was Sunday. I also had dinner with a publisher. In attendance were mostly those of us on Carnegie and Notables committees. It was nice to get to know some new people and catch up with old friends. 

Thank you all for your patience as I get these reports up. As you can see from this report, there is a lot of information that needed to be addressed and doing it quickly while exhausted after midnight each  night was not ideal for me or you.

Back tomorrow with my final recap for Monday. And then Friday's blog post will be a summarization of the entire conference from my perspective. Back after the 4th with regular blogging.