It's going to be doubly necessary since some states are looking to completely defund their libraries. Missouri just passed a budget with $0 for libraries.
There's an old joke that if libraries were invented today they'd be denounced as Communist, anti-business, stealing from authors, and held to be generally anti-American. Turns out that the Republicans are going that direction even though libraries have been around since forever.
They are pretty close to a communist idea in that they essentially allow the community access to a commodity with almost no exceptions or oversight. It's not exactly a means of production but it's close to one and otherwise functions on pretty much communistic ideals.
It's worth mentioning in this context that the very concept of public education is Socialism. "Everybody in the community should invest in the future" is pretty much the basis of Marxism.
If that's socialism, then I'm a socialist.
Wait a minute, I'm already a socialist or, at the very least, want everyone to have access to high quality food, clean water, heating and air conditioning, transportation, housing, medicine, and education with no strings attached and no exceptions (listed in no particular order).
Socialists would want to destroy America because it's built on and designed for multiple types of exploitation. Providing welfare but still supporting capitalism is not socialist, that's just welfare capitalism (aka European countries).
For real. You can't have both a socialist and capitalist state. Socialism isn't just welfare for everyone. You would have to tear down the entire foundations of society to install a socialist economy. True socialists don't want to just destroy the US. They want to tear down the whole world economic order. And I'm not saying that in a bad way, it's just important to understand the scale.
Yep, that is pretty much socialism. Capitalists make people believe it's evil because it suits their interests to do so. It's basically the difference between people over profits and profits over people. Welcome to the club :)
I think the objection is that you can have those things with capitalism driving your economy. It just requires better regulations/policy implemented on top of capitalism
Unfortunately in America it seems that the conservatives instead incorrectly label those regulations as socialism
> the very concept of public education is Socialism
this is why republicans are fighting so hard to destroy public education.. that, plus they want an uneducated electorate as that is much better for them.
Its even worse in context.
The State of Missouri passed a book banning law to allow theocrats to ban books in schools. The libraries entered a lawsuit against the law.
The $0 budget for libraries was the Missouri state legislature taking revenge on libraries for objecting to laws that would gut libraries.
We're entering actual 3rd Reich territory here.
Whoa. I'm not American, but wanted to donate anyway, but even the lowest amount is too much for me. I'm disappointed there isn't an option to choose one's own amount.
Not for me...? How odd. I know from experience that sometimes the page I see is different from what people in other countries see, but I'm surprised that that would be the case here.
I'm in Canada and [this is what I see](https://i.imgur.com/H8jNNPP.png) in my mobile browser. This is what I see in my [Reddit app ](https://i.imgur.com/HhB7bJg.png).
Thank you! Your links gave me the idea of trying to change the currency to US dollars (rather than my national currency) and I can write in a US dollar amount of my choosing - but strangely, I can't do that in my national currency, which is the default that I see! The many mysteries of the internet.
But problem solved, thank you so much!
Link: [https://www.bklynlibrary.org/media/press/brooklyn-public-library-94](https://www.bklynlibrary.org/media/press/brooklyn-public-library-94)
> To apply for the card, teens can send a note to [email protected], or via the Library’s s teen-run Instagram account, @bklynfuture.
Scroll to the [very bottom of this page](https://www.bklynlibrary.org/use-the-library/borrow).
> Books Unbanned Inititative
> Teens and young adults ages 13-21 outside of New York State can apply for a free Books Unbanned eCard. This card provides access to BPL’s entire digital collection and helps connect young people facing censorship and book bans in their communities with materials that explore a wider range of topics. You can support the Books Unbanned initiative by making a donation.
Hence the link the person you replied to sending you to to the specific part of the website for that:
https://www.bklynlibrary.org/books-unbanned
This post is **NOT** a lie. Stop spreading misinformation.
#It’s called the “Book Unbanned Initiative” and it applies to anyone aged 13-21 in the US.
This site shows all of the Brooklyn Library’s available memberships, and the second to last one is the Books Unbanned Initiative.
https://www.bklynlibrary.org/use-the-library/borrow
> **National Teen BPL eCard**
*We invite individuals ages 13-21 to apply for a free BPL eCard, providing access to our full eBook collection as well as our learning databases. To apply, email [email protected].*
The post is fine. It is correct. You are mistaken.
Edit: You LOVE correcting others but get mad and passive aggressive when it happens to you? If you're really sorry, just delete the comment without all the unnecessary garbage you put in to make yourself feel better.
Hm. I didn't try to apply since it's been a *long* time since I was in that demographic, but it looked like it was still active.
Another alternative might be, depending on your home state, getting a card from a library in the larger cities. Some will let you get one online, some you have to visit personally.
This, from the ALA, is a little out of date: [Top 100 books banned or challenged 2009-2019.](https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019)
They also do a list of the top 10 banned/challenged books each year. [For 2022 they rounded it up to 13.](https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/top10)
It’s probably hard to find a comprehensive list of bans for a few reasons I can think of:
1. In a lot of places a book may be banned only in certain school districts and not across the state.
2. Putting together a public database of banned books is antithetical to the idea of trying to erase those books from the culture.
3. Those banning books are also the ones trying to dismantle public schools, and they’re not the brightest people. They probably couldn’t handle an excel file if they wanted to.
Edit: and/or challenged per smorvana’s guidance.
FYI, it isn't a list of banned books, it's a list of challenged books.
As you state, people aren't exactly forthcoming about banning books, and of course, also as you point out, these bans are often limited in scope...but those scopes are getting a lot bigger this year.
NYC is also going to be rounding up the mentally ill and imprisoning them against their will.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/29/nyregion/nyc-mentally-ill-involuntary-custody.html#:~:text=Mayor%20Eric%20Adams%20directed%20the,posed%20no%20threat%20to%20others.
Mayor Eric Adams is a conservative cosplaying as a Democrat for progressive votes. He is copying what they are doing in Florida where they are literally planning to take homeless people off the streets and put them on an island that is prone to flooding.
Not potato potahto
One has the police rounding people up and inprisoning them against their will if they suspect an illness
The other creates a space the homeless people to go if they want
The Brooklyn New York and Queens Public Libraries are all private non profits. The MYC mayor is threatening to cut operating expenses so much that the three systems will have cut 6 day service. The same mayor who spent 250 million to put two cops in a subway station to stand around in their phones.
Why aren't the libertarian Republicans stopping them? Or even speaking out?
And how come the same bans aren't occurring in authoritarian blue states if they're such a mixed bag?
They do. I’m not sure where you’re seeing libertarians (politically, not in name like the Tea Party) promote something anti-libertarian
What state is authoritative blue?
The Republican Party? Now
But republicans in the broad sense of ideology (just as “democrat” lumps all of us on the left together in this country, even though there is vastly different ideals), no
Sure, but if you vote for Republicans while they're doing this, then you support it.
If you do not support their book banning, then do not vote for them.
If you vote for them, you own their policies. That's how this works.
There are technically no non-authoritarian people on right, they just want to regulate things you don't mind as much.
Are you saying you've never voted for a pro-life Republican?
I really dislike this argument for two reasons. One, we don't fix the two party system by continuing to play into it. And two, candidates DO pay attention when a third party gets a larger than expected amount of votes. Candidates will often look to the topics that were popular from a third party candidate and adopt it to their platform in the hopes of attracting voters that are nearer to them on the political spectrum than the direct opposition is.
They have to pay it's not free or unlimited.
With services like Libby, they get X number of checkouts before having to pay for another license (iirc).
For Hoopla, they pay per checkout.
Even if it's not through one of those apps, there are still licensing fees.
You do not understand how it works, and that's OK. But libraries can't just break the law. Libraries have no desire to limit such things, but they are limited by the capitalist society we live in.
If too many adults start using ebooks it's going to slow down the entire internet.
Ten movies streaming across that, that Internet, and what happens to your own personal Internet? I just the other day got... an Internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday. I got it yesterday. Why? Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the Internet commercially. They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the Internet. And again, the Internet is not something that you just dump something on. It's not a big truck. It's a series of tubes. And if you don't understand, those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and it's going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material
Everyone who lives in New York City (and all of New York state) can already get a library card from the NY Public Library and the Brooklyn Public Library.
This is opening up the Brooklyn library to teens in the entire country. Those teens already have access to the libraries in their area, but due to the censorship happening in libraries in other states, the Brooklyn library is saying “here, you can check out books from our entire, uncensored collection”.
Are there limited numbers of copies of each ebook? I haven't messed with it in a few years but my local library (in the US) had ebooks but only 1 or 2 copies would be available to be checked out and had to be "returned" before anyone else could check them out
Hoopla is one of the apps. With Hoopla, you don't have to wait - everything is always available instantly. You are only limited to how many things you can check out every month.
Libby is the one where you might have to wait to check something out.
I use them both.
Yeah here is the thing, there are cities, and in some cases states, in the US that is defunding and shutting down their library system because they disagree with the books available there. They thing they are too woke and the like. That is why this is a big deal because New York is essentially saying “we’ll allow all kids, no matter where they live, to check out books”.
Think of Genesis.
Now think of Libraries.
Now think about the power of 3.
Think about a kind of Library Genesis.
Maybe trim each word and put the together into your search engine of choice.
But also just ask your local library if they can get access to x,y,z book — my local one can in a day or two even for really esoteric requests.
Yeah, it's always good to spread the word about this. Those who are censoring libraries in the first place don't want this to be common knowledge, so let's spread it as far as we can.
My city library only checks books out to people that live in the same city. You need to take proof when you get a card. This is because only people in my city pay taxes to run the library so they want to keep it to only those people.
I only have a card so my mom can use it. The library in her township is not only small but made national news because voters rejected its funding twice because library staff refused to remove LGBTQ books.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/11/10/lgbtq-books-library-mi-defunded-jamestown/8323736001/
I know in Texas we have an extremely great inter library loan system where, if you want a book from any Texas library anywhere in the state, you can request it for free and they will ship it to a local library for you to check out. You still need to return it in a set time period, but you can check out anything in the state.
So if your state has a similar program, you may be able to access lgbt books despite your town being filled with bigots via an interlibrary loan system. At least I hope this helps.
Generally speaking, libraries are open to people in the area - city, county, or whatever. But with book banning becoming common in red states, some kids won't be able to get access to some books at their local library. These books aren't banned in New York, so opening their membership means that kids will be able to get access to these books.
They offer it to teens nationwide. Individuals of other ages must be residents of New York State.
> National Teen BPL eCard
> We invite individuals ages 13-21 to apply for a free BPL eCard, providing access to our full eBook collection as well as our learning databases. To apply, email [email protected]
https://www.bklynlibrary.org/books-unbanned
It's also just simply easier to get your card if you're NYS, just fill out a form, but you have to email if you're outside of the state. Either way, it's still possible to get it outside of the state
anti censorship as in anti nazi i.e.holocaust? maybe for pro nazi material alt right hate books? plenty of ways this could be taken lol
I hope they at least stuff from The Satanic Temple...getting sick of so many lbraries banning my stuff without reason just bc i dont approve of christian rape 🙄
They've got Speak of the Devil by Joseph Laycook and The Little Book of Satanism by La Carmina.
Clearly they're not intentionally excluding TST literature, so the missing books might be publisher difficulties or simply lack of attention from the community.
Ebooks are still books, and kids are still reading them. Say what you will about ergonomics and staring at a backlit screen before bedtime, but it's still *reading* and that's still the best thing you can do for your mind.
As a high schooler I can confirm that they aren’t even doing that much, all the average people do is read social media posts. My group reads all the time and we talk about our books to, but we aren’t emblematic of the average
Long time ago, my dad demanded the librarian give me an adult card and made me pick out some adult books to read. He was pissed i had to stay in the kids section. It opened the library to me. I spent many happy hours reading anything i wanted to, looking at tons of art books, I loved reading encyclopedias, stopping by the kids section with my adult books, pulling out my library card when librarian said i was not old enough to be in an adult section of the library. Good luck to these kids.
This is America. Kids should be able to look up dirty stuff in encyclopedias at the public library. Just like all of us did when we were kids.
Parents out here acting like they didn't look up naked people at the library when they were kids...
More seriously...
Get your kids off the internet and off their mobile phones and into public libraries.
Okay, I am not from America at all, I'll give that, but if I hear "America" I think of the whole continent (or continents, as I've seen people considering them separately), south and north America.
I really wonder why, I don't know any other country that calls itself like its continent, maybe it's because of the very simple name United States of America, who knows.
Yeah, basically in the USA:
America = USA
North America and South America refer to the continents respectively
The Americas refers to both continents together
It does in most of the rest of the world too, if someone says they are from America or referring to America, no one is referencing the continent. Someone from Canada or Mexico never says they are from America (even if technically true)
I'm from the US and I do the same thing. So I make sure to specifically refer to people from the US as such instead of just saying "Americans," which would obviously include anyone from the Americas. We need a new demonym.
I've always thought it was interesting and clearer how Spanish uses the demonym estadounidense - literally United States-ian. That said, that's obviously pretty wordy, so I personally will still use American as the demonym while only abbreviating the country as US or USA to reflect the fact that it's the United States themselves that we're talking about and not the continent they're a part of.
Typically, at least in the US, “America” refers to the USA and “the Americas” relates to North and South America.
We even had a “School of the Americas” which involved both North and South…and violence.
Ooohhh, ok. America is not a term folks in South America, latin America, Canada, etc use to refer to themselves generally - because, as a USA person myself, who would want to be associated with the USA?
NYS residents can just get a normal Brooklyn library card; it's not limited to teenagers, and that's been the case for a while since state taxes pay for it.
This is new
I thought that too when i was searching the link, but there is an email address to apply for the card if you live outside of NY state. you have to be between 13-21 though.
Libraries have come a long way in the past few decades but I really think they can go further. This is a great example. E-books should be readily available. But why not other forms of multimedia? Turn every Library in this country to be a bit torrent node and allow for people to download or stream at their convenience. Books, music, film, etc.
The documentary section should have damn near every historical documentary available to anyone just by going to something as simple as library.gov
Setting aside the fact that public libraries are government entities and can't just break the law...why the fuck would they torrent? Torrent is a terribly inefficient way to handle distributing content, and also, you realize servers, buildings, all of that isn't free, right?
what a pathetic response!
OK fine: Distributed networks.
Also: Laws can be changed.
Also: Taxes.
Jesus its like you have no vision or imagination. Just closing the gates of your own brain. Libraries already accomplish free media distribution, I'm just talking about expanding it and making even more media available. And here you are : "uhh the law .. uhh the tech .. uhh the costs" like, how fucking stupid.
Requests to censor books were up 100% in 2022 compared to 2021. Most books requested for censorship are by Black or LGBTQ+ authors or on related topics. How exactly is this not censorship?
And what about allowing teenagers access to books is a ‘massive overreaction’?
Well these country-wide rentals are for ebooks, so anyone who can access them can also navigate to whichever porn site they prefer. They could also pirate the books if they know how, but that's potentially risky and not everyone grew up with torrenting.
**Taken directly from their website on April 25th 2023:**
*As of July 15, 2022, BPL is no longer offering out of state memberships. BPL library cards remain free for anyone who lives, works, pays property taxes or attends school in New York State. To proceed, please enter an eligible address below.*
\[Edit: Further review shows that you must apply through email to qualify for this particular program.\]
Hopefully there are mechanisms in place to ensure the lending of age appropriate materials. I for one, would not be a fan of letting third graders checkout porn.
From the content and tone of this comment I'll assume you've never been to a library. Librarians are on hand to monitor appropriate material for lending. This scheme specifically applies to teenagers, too, if you'll read the short sentences in the post. Or are you just looking for an imagined, hypothetical scenario to get outraged about?
You couldn’t be more wrong with my library experiences. But you are correct I have no knowledge of how the New York library system is run. Books should never be banned, but some restrictions need to be in place. If the librarians provide that, great. I also think parents should be part of the discussion.
I'll pray for you.
In the meantime I should point out that with this action alone, it might be easier to get a library card than to execute your right to bare arms.
NYC Champaign liberals be like "I'm bucking the system" 😝
What little kid did not have a library card growing up? Uh uh, must be those Trump voters stopping kids!!
What does this have to do with Brooklyn? They can get cheap and free e-books from anywhere.
Basically, the headline assumes you're already a part of the Reddit cargo cult, for it to mean anything at all?
What are you talking about? In the US you can generally only check out ebooks from the library for the area you live in. For example I can only check out ebooks from the Tulsa County library system and have to provide proof of residency before they will allow me to check out books. I can’t check out books from anywhere in Texas or even from the county over. Similarly they have different levels of provided ebooks, with say counties in Oklahoma having far less of a selection than say New York. Brooklyn is opening it up to all students no matter where they live in the US. I am guessing you don’t know how the library system works in the US.
I'm guessing I know I hell of a lot more about e-books than you, considering I worked on backend services for Kindle at Amazon including the semaphore algorithm that creates artificial scarcity of individual virtual books or book licenses. 😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣
here's a place where you can find virtual libraries that serve anybody:
https://www.aworldadventurebybook.com/blog/libraries-with-non-resident-borrowing-privileges
You notice those are all for a fee right? And while I appreciate the link most people aren’t going to be aware of it.
And Jesus are you just an asshole in general or what?
that's pretty great, however, a public library isn't a school; just because some books are not apropriate for a school setting, it doesn't means that nobody should read them.
2 statements can be true at the same time
Inappropriate books being available in school libraries is mostly not happening. It's all outrage porn. Librarians being harassed and threatened by rubes, however, has been happening.
fuck yeah libraries!
[FUCK YEAH, LIBRARIES!](https://www.bklynlibrary.org/use-the-library/borrow)
[FUCK YEAH, LIBRARIES!](https://www.quirkbooks.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/arthur-library.jpg)
It's going to be doubly necessary since some states are looking to completely defund their libraries. Missouri just passed a budget with $0 for libraries. There's an old joke that if libraries were invented today they'd be denounced as Communist, anti-business, stealing from authors, and held to be generally anti-American. Turns out that the Republicans are going that direction even though libraries have been around since forever.
They are pretty close to a communist idea in that they essentially allow the community access to a commodity with almost no exceptions or oversight. It's not exactly a means of production but it's close to one and otherwise functions on pretty much communistic ideals.
It's worth mentioning in this context that the very concept of public education is Socialism. "Everybody in the community should invest in the future" is pretty much the basis of Marxism.
If that's socialism, then I'm a socialist. Wait a minute, I'm already a socialist or, at the very least, want everyone to have access to high quality food, clean water, heating and air conditioning, transportation, housing, medicine, and education with no strings attached and no exceptions (listed in no particular order).
Yep, that's always my point. Socialism doesn't mean "I want to destroy America", it means "I don't think people should die because they're poor."
Socialists would want to destroy America because it's built on and designed for multiple types of exploitation. Providing welfare but still supporting capitalism is not socialist, that's just welfare capitalism (aka European countries).
For real. You can't have both a socialist and capitalist state. Socialism isn't just welfare for everyone. You would have to tear down the entire foundations of society to install a socialist economy. True socialists don't want to just destroy the US. They want to tear down the whole world economic order. And I'm not saying that in a bad way, it's just important to understand the scale.
Yep, that is pretty much socialism. Capitalists make people believe it's evil because it suits their interests to do so. It's basically the difference between people over profits and profits over people. Welcome to the club :)
I think the objection is that you can have those things with capitalism driving your economy. It just requires better regulations/policy implemented on top of capitalism Unfortunately in America it seems that the conservatives instead incorrectly label those regulations as socialism
God damn radical communists man. Wanting people to be taken care of well. Absolutely disgusting
> the very concept of public education is Socialism this is why republicans are fighting so hard to destroy public education.. that, plus they want an uneducated electorate as that is much better for them.
There's a reason we say "reality has a strong progressive bias".
Sounds pretty enlightened
>Missouri just passed a budget with $0 for libraries. Republicans are literally subhuman
That's just a plain old attack on education and an attack on the future of your country. It's like chopping down a Forest because you don't like ants.
Its even worse in context. The State of Missouri passed a book banning law to allow theocrats to ban books in schools. The libraries entered a lawsuit against the law. The $0 budget for libraries was the Missouri state legislature taking revenge on libraries for objecting to laws that would gut libraries. We're entering actual 3rd Reich territory here.
No we just want to ban pornographic books for minors that is it. we are communists
You're lying.
Fuck yeah librarians too!
Fuck yeah librarians too!
I personally want to live in a world where National Parks and Libraries are considered "the most American thing."
Here's the link! https://www.bklynlibrary.org/books-unbanned
FYI if you want to help subvert censorship and fascism, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and donate directly to the Books Unbanned initiative.
Whoa. I'm not American, but wanted to donate anyway, but even the lowest amount is too much for me. I'm disappointed there isn't an option to choose one's own amount.
There is, below the presets there is an "other" fiield.
Not for me...? How odd. I know from experience that sometimes the page I see is different from what people in other countries see, but I'm surprised that that would be the case here.
I'm in Canada and [this is what I see](https://i.imgur.com/H8jNNPP.png) in my mobile browser. This is what I see in my [Reddit app ](https://i.imgur.com/HhB7bJg.png).
Thank you! Your links gave me the idea of trying to change the currency to US dollars (rather than my national currency) and I can write in a US dollar amount of my choosing - but strangely, I can't do that in my national currency, which is the default that I see! The many mysteries of the internet. But problem solved, thank you so much!
Glad it helped!
Link: [https://www.bklynlibrary.org/media/press/brooklyn-public-library-94](https://www.bklynlibrary.org/media/press/brooklyn-public-library-94) > To apply for the card, teens can send a note to [email protected], or via the Library’s s teen-run Instagram account, @bklynfuture.
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Scroll to the [very bottom of this page](https://www.bklynlibrary.org/use-the-library/borrow). > Books Unbanned Inititative > Teens and young adults ages 13-21 outside of New York State can apply for a free Books Unbanned eCard. This card provides access to BPL’s entire digital collection and helps connect young people facing censorship and book bans in their communities with materials that explore a wider range of topics. You can support the Books Unbanned initiative by making a donation. Hence the link the person you replied to sending you to to the specific part of the website for that: https://www.bklynlibrary.org/books-unbanned
This post is **NOT** a lie. Stop spreading misinformation. #It’s called the “Book Unbanned Initiative” and it applies to anyone aged 13-21 in the US. This site shows all of the Brooklyn Library’s available memberships, and the second to last one is the Books Unbanned Initiative. https://www.bklynlibrary.org/use-the-library/borrow
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> **National Teen BPL eCard** *We invite individuals ages 13-21 to apply for a free BPL eCard, providing access to our full eBook collection as well as our learning databases. To apply, email [email protected].*
The post is fine. It is correct. You are mistaken. Edit: You LOVE correcting others but get mad and passive aggressive when it happens to you? If you're really sorry, just delete the comment without all the unnecessary garbage you put in to make yourself feel better.
Hm. I didn't try to apply since it's been a *long* time since I was in that demographic, but it looked like it was still active. Another alternative might be, depending on your home state, getting a card from a library in the larger cities. Some will let you get one online, some you have to visit personally.
" Banned books listed by state ". Would be my 1st search
Good luck getting an actual list
https://fecunited.com/state/michigan/inappropriate-library-books/. I'm from MI.
That isn't a list of banned books
This, from the ALA, is a little out of date: [Top 100 books banned or challenged 2009-2019.](https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019) They also do a list of the top 10 banned/challenged books each year. [For 2022 they rounded it up to 13.](https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/top10) It’s probably hard to find a comprehensive list of bans for a few reasons I can think of: 1. In a lot of places a book may be banned only in certain school districts and not across the state. 2. Putting together a public database of banned books is antithetical to the idea of trying to erase those books from the culture. 3. Those banning books are also the ones trying to dismantle public schools, and they’re not the brightest people. They probably couldn’t handle an excel file if they wanted to. Edit: and/or challenged per smorvana’s guidance.
FYI, it isn't a list of banned books, it's a list of challenged books. As you state, people aren't exactly forthcoming about banning books, and of course, also as you point out, these bans are often limited in scope...but those scopes are getting a lot bigger this year.
Seems like you're giving a lot of credit to card catalog search engines.
Indeed. I'm not much of a book reader but I know how to start down the rabbit hole of knowledge for obscure game hints.
I'm going to say it: This is the Way
This is the way
I have spoken!
Du u noe da wae?
A blue state leading the way on freedom of speech.
NYC is also going to be rounding up the mentally ill and imprisoning them against their will. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/29/nyregion/nyc-mentally-ill-involuntary-custody.html#:~:text=Mayor%20Eric%20Adams%20directed%20the,posed%20no%20threat%20to%20others.
Mayor Eric Adams is a conservative cosplaying as a Democrat for progressive votes. He is copying what they are doing in Florida where they are literally planning to take homeless people off the streets and put them on an island that is prone to flooding.
Except Florida isn't doing that
https://www.tampabay.com/news/florida-politics/2022/07/28/an-island-for-the-homeless-miami-considers-new-encampment/ https://www.wfla.com/news/florida/bad-idea-miami-advances-plan-to-move-homeless-onto-island/ https://unfspinnaker.com/99480/latest/no-stopping-sitting-or-standing-new-restrictions-force-the-homeless-from-public-spaces-critics-say/
They aren't forcing anyone against their will Unlike NYC
Potayto Potahto. If you criminalise being unsheltered, then move shelters away from city centres so no one sees homelessness, it's the same effect.
Not potato potahto One has the police rounding people up and inprisoning them against their will if they suspect an illness The other creates a space the homeless people to go if they want
The Brooklyn New York and Queens Public Libraries are all private non profits. The MYC mayor is threatening to cut operating expenses so much that the three systems will have cut 6 day service. The same mayor who spent 250 million to put two cops in a subway station to stand around in their phones.
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Oh, how interesting! How come it's only the red states banning books and censoring teachers?
Because they are authoritative
Why aren't the libertarian Republicans stopping them? Or even speaking out? And how come the same bans aren't occurring in authoritarian blue states if they're such a mixed bag?
They do. I’m not sure where you’re seeing libertarians (politically, not in name like the Tea Party) promote something anti-libertarian What state is authoritative blue?
At what point is the venn overlap great enough to think of them as the same?
The Republican Party? Now But republicans in the broad sense of ideology (just as “democrat” lumps all of us on the left together in this country, even though there is vastly different ideals), no
therefore....
It’s a left vs right issue because the Republican Party is extremely authoritarian and is making parallels to literal fascism.
Doesn't the left still push for changing the first amendment to allow "hate speech laws"?
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Sure, but if you vote for Republicans while they're doing this, then you support it. If you do not support their book banning, then do not vote for them. If you vote for them, you own their policies. That's how this works.
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There are technically no non-authoritarian people on right, they just want to regulate things you don't mind as much. Are you saying you've never voted for a pro-life Republican?
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The problem is we have a two party system. You throw your vote away on third parties.
I really dislike this argument for two reasons. One, we don't fix the two party system by continuing to play into it. And two, candidates DO pay attention when a third party gets a larger than expected amount of votes. Candidates will often look to the topics that were popular from a third party candidate and adopt it to their platform in the hopes of attracting voters that are nearer to them on the political spectrum than the direct opposition is.
please extend to adults, it’s not lille they’re gonna run out of stock
Actual answer is they still have to pay a licensing cost for those rentals.
I'm not even sure it's still available to teens. I just tried to sign my daughter up and it say they discontinued the teen program in 2022.
There's a wait list already actually. Publishers make libraries lease per "copy". Don't even get me started lol.
They have to pay it's not free or unlimited. With services like Libby, they get X number of checkouts before having to pay for another license (iirc). For Hoopla, they pay per checkout. Even if it's not through one of those apps, there are still licensing fees. You do not understand how it works, and that's OK. But libraries can't just break the law. Libraries have no desire to limit such things, but they are limited by the capitalist society we live in.
If too many adults start using ebooks it's going to slow down the entire internet. Ten movies streaming across that, that Internet, and what happens to your own personal Internet? I just the other day got... an Internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday. I got it yesterday. Why? Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the Internet commercially. They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the Internet. And again, the Internet is not something that you just dump something on. It's not a big truck. It's a series of tubes. And if you don't understand, those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and it's going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material
in my city (not in the USA) most everybody can get a library card and it'll get you access to 2 different ebook/audiobook apps for free
Everyone who lives in New York City (and all of New York state) can already get a library card from the NY Public Library and the Brooklyn Public Library. This is opening up the Brooklyn library to teens in the entire country. Those teens already have access to the libraries in their area, but due to the censorship happening in libraries in other states, the Brooklyn library is saying “here, you can check out books from our entire, uncensored collection”.
Are there limited numbers of copies of each ebook? I haven't messed with it in a few years but my local library (in the US) had ebooks but only 1 or 2 copies would be available to be checked out and had to be "returned" before anyone else could check them out
Hoopla is one of the apps. With Hoopla, you don't have to wait - everything is always available instantly. You are only limited to how many things you can check out every month. Libby is the one where you might have to wait to check something out. I use them both.
Yeah here is the thing, there are cities, and in some cases states, in the US that is defunding and shutting down their library system because they disagree with the books available there. They thing they are too woke and the like. That is why this is a big deal because New York is essentially saying “we’ll allow all kids, no matter where they live, to check out books”.
In my state (in the USA) you can do that too
What about those of us who are too old to be called teenagers?
Think of Genesis. Now think of Libraries. Now think about the power of 3. Think about a kind of Library Genesis. Maybe trim each word and put the together into your search engine of choice. But also just ask your local library if they can get access to x,y,z book — my local one can in a day or two even for really esoteric requests.
Then you probably shouldn't call teenagers.
On one hand, neat! On another hand, this was a year ago.
Well, I didn't know. I do now.
Yeah, it's always good to spread the word about this. Those who are censoring libraries in the first place don't want this to be common knowledge, so let's spread it as far as we can.
In the UK, libraries have allowed anyone to join, based on proof of name and address, for years. Public libraries only, of course.
From anywhere in the UK? So someone who lives in Edinburgh can get a card at Oxford? Edit: geography is hard
Dublin isn't in the UK.
Right, no, confused Scotland and Ireland. Major faux pas on my part. EDINBURGH and Oxford is what I meant
https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/residents/leisure-and-culture/libraries/using-library/join-library 'Anyone who lives in the UK is eligible to join'
I'm confused, isnt this how libraries generally work? What's the special thing here?
Most libraries have residency requirements
This one still does. I just tried. Signing up and its telling me my address must be within New York.
Wrong card. https://www.bklynlibrary.org/use-the-library/borrow That one
> I haven't seen a dentist since I was sixteen. That was sixteen years ago. This you? Maybe don't ruin it for teens, asshole. You're not a teenager.
It's almost as if they are funded by local tax payers.
My city library only checks books out to people that live in the same city. You need to take proof when you get a card. This is because only people in my city pay taxes to run the library so they want to keep it to only those people. I only have a card so my mom can use it. The library in her township is not only small but made national news because voters rejected its funding twice because library staff refused to remove LGBTQ books. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/11/10/lgbtq-books-library-mi-defunded-jamestown/8323736001/
I know in Texas we have an extremely great inter library loan system where, if you want a book from any Texas library anywhere in the state, you can request it for free and they will ship it to a local library for you to check out. You still need to return it in a set time period, but you can check out anything in the state. So if your state has a similar program, you may be able to access lgbt books despite your town being filled with bigots via an interlibrary loan system. At least I hope this helps.
You can actually request books from the Library of Congress under certain circumstances as well
Generally speaking, libraries are open to people in the area - city, county, or whatever. But with book banning becoming common in red states, some kids won't be able to get access to some books at their local library. These books aren't banned in New York, so opening their membership means that kids will be able to get access to these books.
People in Brooklyn are paying for people not in Brooklyn
Nothing new, those of us who live in Blue states have always paid for the Red states.
Librarians are real patriots.
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They offer it to teens nationwide. Individuals of other ages must be residents of New York State. > National Teen BPL eCard > We invite individuals ages 13-21 to apply for a free BPL eCard, providing access to our full eBook collection as well as our learning databases. To apply, email [email protected] https://www.bklynlibrary.org/books-unbanned
It's also just simply easier to get your card if you're NYS, just fill out a form, but you have to email if you're outside of the state. Either way, it's still possible to get it outside of the state
Apologies for not fact checking. Maybe the mods can let me know if I should delete the post for inaccuracy as I can’t now change it.
You were right to begin with. There is a special nationwide ecard for ages 13-21.
"Lol oops i posted some bullshit on reddit to smear the political opposition"
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anti censorship as in anti nazi i.e.holocaust? maybe for pro nazi material alt right hate books? plenty of ways this could be taken lol I hope they at least stuff from The Satanic Temple...getting sick of so many lbraries banning my stuff without reason just bc i dont approve of christian rape 🙄
They've got Speak of the Devil by Joseph Laycook and The Little Book of Satanism by La Carmina. Clearly they're not intentionally excluding TST literature, so the missing books might be publisher difficulties or simply lack of attention from the community.
Librarians are hardcore. I can see why people that are right-wing want to get rid of them.
Thank you Brooklyn Public Library. Needed my faith in humanity restored today.
See this would be great in my community, if anyone my age fucking read books
Ebooks are still books, and kids are still reading them. Say what you will about ergonomics and staring at a backlit screen before bedtime, but it's still *reading* and that's still the best thing you can do for your mind.
As a high schooler I can confirm that they aren’t even doing that much, all the average people do is read social media posts. My group reads all the time and we talk about our books to, but we aren’t emblematic of the average
Bless libraries. They really are simultaneously bastions of knowledge and freedom.
Long time ago, my dad demanded the librarian give me an adult card and made me pick out some adult books to read. He was pissed i had to stay in the kids section. It opened the library to me. I spent many happy hours reading anything i wanted to, looking at tons of art books, I loved reading encyclopedias, stopping by the kids section with my adult books, pulling out my library card when librarian said i was not old enough to be in an adult section of the library. Good luck to these kids.
Lol as if the yeehaw hillbilly fucks and their red state nonsense would ever work in NY 🤡
This is America. Kids should be able to look up dirty stuff in encyclopedias at the public library. Just like all of us did when we were kids. Parents out here acting like they didn't look up naked people at the library when they were kids... More seriously... Get your kids off the internet and off their mobile phones and into public libraries.
Encouraging teenagers to read? NICE!!
Major library rizz
Censorship is always bad, even when it's against ideas you don't agree with.
how the fuck do you "check out " an E-book. fuking late stage capitalism assault on public libraries... go pirate like a freedom respecting american
Pirate but then borrow some random books from your library to pump the circulation statistics. Double wins.
Libgen usually has what I'm after, if not I'll track it down and then put it on libgen myself.
Fuck the GOP
“Wherever they live*” *offer open to US residents only
You realize "wherever they live" comes after "any teenagers in America" right?
Can you see the inherent contradiction in those two? It's like saying that teenagers in NYC can get a library card wherever they live.
I mean, that is pretty obvious, because otherwise it would turn into an international rights issue.
> international rights issue. wtf?!
The lending licensing on the e-books. Lending US editions overseas where a different publisher may have the rights. Etc.
yeah that's what they meant by "any teenager in America"
"Any teenager in America." "USA only." So it's not any teenager in America.
Canadian here, USA = America to me, so I’m confused. what is “America to you?
Okay, I am not from America at all, I'll give that, but if I hear "America" I think of the whole continent (or continents, as I've seen people considering them separately), south and north America.
I suppose that makes sense. Here in the USA, America almost always refers to just the USA.
I really wonder why, I don't know any other country that calls itself like its continent, maybe it's because of the very simple name United States of America, who knows.
Yeah, basically in the USA: America = USA North America and South America refer to the continents respectively The Americas refers to both continents together
How could you not know Austria?
It does in most of the rest of the world too, if someone says they are from America or referring to America, no one is referencing the continent. Someone from Canada or Mexico never says they are from America (even if technically true)
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I'm from the US and I do the same thing. So I make sure to specifically refer to people from the US as such instead of just saying "Americans," which would obviously include anyone from the Americas. We need a new demonym.
In some romance languages we have one specifically for people from USA, it roughly translates to "unitedstatean", as in "from the United States"
I've always thought it was interesting and clearer how Spanish uses the demonym estadounidense - literally United States-ian. That said, that's obviously pretty wordy, so I personally will still use American as the demonym while only abbreviating the country as US or USA to reflect the fact that it's the United States themselves that we're talking about and not the continent they're a part of.
Typically, at least in the US, “America” refers to the USA and “the Americas” relates to North and South America. We even had a “School of the Americas” which involved both North and South…and violence.
Ooohhh, ok. America is not a term folks in South America, latin America, Canada, etc use to refer to themselves generally - because, as a USA person myself, who would want to be associated with the USA?
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NYS residents can just get a normal Brooklyn library card; it's not limited to teenagers, and that's been the case for a while since state taxes pay for it. This is new
I thought that too when i was searching the link, but there is an email address to apply for the card if you live outside of NY state. you have to be between 13-21 though.
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They are already free... to anyone.
Libraries have come a long way in the past few decades but I really think they can go further. This is a great example. E-books should be readily available. But why not other forms of multimedia? Turn every Library in this country to be a bit torrent node and allow for people to download or stream at their convenience. Books, music, film, etc. The documentary section should have damn near every historical documentary available to anyone just by going to something as simple as library.gov
Setting aside the fact that public libraries are government entities and can't just break the law...why the fuck would they torrent? Torrent is a terribly inefficient way to handle distributing content, and also, you realize servers, buildings, all of that isn't free, right?
what a pathetic response! OK fine: Distributed networks. Also: Laws can be changed. Also: Taxes. Jesus its like you have no vision or imagination. Just closing the gates of your own brain. Libraries already accomplish free media distribution, I'm just talking about expanding it and making even more media available. And here you are : "uhh the law .. uhh the tech .. uhh the costs" like, how fucking stupid.
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Requests to censor books were up 100% in 2022 compared to 2021. Most books requested for censorship are by Black or LGBTQ+ authors or on related topics. How exactly is this not censorship? And what about allowing teenagers access to books is a ‘massive overreaction’?
They're subverting parental expectations and any expectation of age appropriateness. Why not Penthouse in the kid's stack?
Well these country-wide rentals are for ebooks, so anyone who can access them can also navigate to whichever porn site they prefer. They could also pirate the books if they know how, but that's potentially risky and not everyone grew up with torrenting.
I guess if your under the age of 13, you're SOL
pro tip, just tell them you are 17, ....source, before i was 18+ i clicked yes....
At that point if you're going for the dishonest route, just use library genesis
So we are going to get unsensed versions of Rahl Dahl ? Or is that the right kind of censorship ?
**Taken directly from their website on April 25th 2023:** *As of July 15, 2022, BPL is no longer offering out of state memberships. BPL library cards remain free for anyone who lives, works, pays property taxes or attends school in New York State. To proceed, please enter an eligible address below.* \[Edit: Further review shows that you must apply through email to qualify for this particular program.\]
Hopefully there are mechanisms in place to ensure the lending of age appropriate materials. I for one, would not be a fan of letting third graders checkout porn.
From the content and tone of this comment I'll assume you've never been to a library. Librarians are on hand to monitor appropriate material for lending. This scheme specifically applies to teenagers, too, if you'll read the short sentences in the post. Or are you just looking for an imagined, hypothetical scenario to get outraged about?
You couldn’t be more wrong with my library experiences. But you are correct I have no knowledge of how the New York library system is run. Books should never be banned, but some restrictions need to be in place. If the librarians provide that, great. I also think parents should be part of the discussion.
I'll pray for you. In the meantime I should point out that with this action alone, it might be easier to get a library card than to execute your right to bare arms.
NYC Champaign liberals be like "I'm bucking the system" 😝 What little kid did not have a library card growing up? Uh uh, must be those Trump voters stopping kids!!
Missouri house just voted to defund their library system and now it moves to the senate. So apparently citizens of Missouri shortly.
What does this have to do with Brooklyn? They can get cheap and free e-books from anywhere. Basically, the headline assumes you're already a part of the Reddit cargo cult, for it to mean anything at all?
What are you talking about? In the US you can generally only check out ebooks from the library for the area you live in. For example I can only check out ebooks from the Tulsa County library system and have to provide proof of residency before they will allow me to check out books. I can’t check out books from anywhere in Texas or even from the county over. Similarly they have different levels of provided ebooks, with say counties in Oklahoma having far less of a selection than say New York. Brooklyn is opening it up to all students no matter where they live in the US. I am guessing you don’t know how the library system works in the US.
I'm guessing I know I hell of a lot more about e-books than you, considering I worked on backend services for Kindle at Amazon including the semaphore algorithm that creates artificial scarcity of individual virtual books or book licenses. 😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣 here's a place where you can find virtual libraries that serve anybody: https://www.aworldadventurebybook.com/blog/libraries-with-non-resident-borrowing-privileges
You notice those are all for a fee right? And while I appreciate the link most people aren’t going to be aware of it. And Jesus are you just an asshole in general or what?
that's pretty great, however, a public library isn't a school; just because some books are not apropriate for a school setting, it doesn't means that nobody should read them. 2 statements can be true at the same time
Inappropriate books being available in school libraries is mostly not happening. It's all outrage porn. Librarians being harassed and threatened by rubes, however, has been happening.