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Literary Activism

It’s Still Censorship, Even If It’s Not a Book Ban: Book Censorship News, August 30, 2024

The four Rs of book censorship are still censorship, even if some feel like a compromise to outright banning books.

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Kelly Jensen

Editor

Kelly is a former librarian and a long-time blogger at STACKED. She's the editor/author of (DON'T) CALL ME CRAZY: 33 VOICES START THE CONVERSATION ABOUT MENTAL HEALTH and the editor/author of HERE WE ARE: FEMINISM FOR THE REAL WORLD. Her next book, BODY TALK, will publish in Fall 2020. Follow her on Instagram @heykellyjensen.

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For years now, those seeking to remove books from school and library shelves have insisted they aren’t banning books. They are, of course, because a book ban is the intentional removal of a book from a place where it once was for reasons outside the norm, such as weeding.

But even if you are not outright banning books, either as a professional in the field or as an outsider, you may still be engaging in censorship. Recall that censorship is the umbrella term for the intentional act of information suppression; it is perpetrated by those with some capacity of power, such as a government body, a private institution, or other group with authority. Catholic Vote — via their “Hide the Pride” campaign — engages in censorship. Moms for Liberty, via their BookLooks database, provokes censorship (especially as they do not believe that meeting the legal definition of obscenity). The information being suppressed can be a whole book, passages from a book, images from a book, and so forth. Materials are being withheld or changed when they’re made available to other people. Book bans are one type of censorship.

The First Amendment protects from censorship except in a very small number of instances, such as imminent threats, and importantly, extends those protections to public institutions, not private. A private school, for example, can determine what they do and do not censor without infringing on the First Amendment. A public school paid for by tax dollars, in most cases, cannot.

So what does censorship look like in the library more broadly? As Dr. Emily Knox explains, there are four Rs:

  • Restriction, or the intentional inability for books to be accessed by all who may want them. This would be putting books behind a desk so that people must ask to borrow them and may be denied if they don’t meet certain requirements.
  • Redaction, the intentional editing or removal of material from a work. Cy-Fair Independent School District (TX) did this when they elected to omit sections from textbooks to be used by students that they disagreed with. Another example would be drawing underwear on a character in a book who may be nude, as was done several times in libraries in the ’70s and ’80s with Maurice Sendak’s In The Night Kitchen.
  • Relocation, the intentional moving of a book from one area of the library to another. This is what Greenville County Libraries (SC) did with their youth LGBTQ+ books. It’s what was going in at East Hamilton Public Library (IN) before the board returned to actually serving its community rather than a few religious zealots.
  • Removal, also known as a book ban.

Here are examples that have become so commonly employed as solutions to “inappropriate” books and/or to appease “parental rights” activists that they’re not being called out as censorship the way they should.

Moving YA Books to the Adult Section

There are dozens of libraries, both public and school, where moving books from their intended audience to a different section has become the compromise to book banning. But in what world is moving books about gender, sexuality, and puberty written for tweens and teens into adult sections of the library not censorship?

Alpena Public Library (MI) has been beleaguered by a small group demanding the removal of inappropriate books in the collection, as well as calling the librarians all manner of groomers. One of the proposals by the county commissioners, who appoint the library board, suggested that books with nudity or sexuality within them be reshelved from the teen section of the library (they really wanted them removed, but would compromise at relocating them). Ultimately, this was not the decision made. Instead, those books are being labeled through a new system that would affix subgenres to the books on shelves. This is not censorship since the books will not be relocated or removed. It does, however, raise significant concerns for how those books will now be specifically called out in a way that is reminiscent of other small-town public libraries who’ve taken to labeling as an onramp to library takeover.

This kind of censorship does not apply solely to moving YA books into the adult section. It’s also moving picture books into a “parenting” section, as seen in many public libraries. It’s also locking away books that some deem to be inappropriate.

Labeling

Speaking of labeling, it’s important to question who labels on books are intended to serve and who gets to be the voice deciding whether or not books need to be labeled. If books are being labeled because they contain LGBTQ+ content, is it in the spirit of helping people find those books or is it to ensure they are inaccessible to an entire demographic. If that label facilitates a block on the book’s use, it’s censorship.

“Sensitive” topics and “inappropriate” content are two of the targets of censors and those descriptions are purposeful: what they mean is left up to interpretation. Libraries that label books with either or similar designations are putting themselves in the role of determining a standard for their collection. What one person deems “inappropriate” may not only be perfectly appropriate but may also be flagrant discrimination. See books called sensitive or inappropriate also labeled “critical race theory” (i.e., books about people of color) or “obscene” (books with queer characters or about puberty or gender).

Labels are tricky, and it’s crucial to have clear, updated language about their purpose in the library.

Ratings Systems

Much like labeling, the question is who has the authority to decide what is or isn’t appropriate for an audience? Creating a label schematic is subjective, and it undermines the systems already in place: publisher age ratings—they put those there for a reason—and professional review sources.

Not only is a creating a new ratings system censorship, it’s also simply not helpful. A library patron has to learn a new system for every library they may visit, and they may find themselves unable to understand what those ratings even mean. Can the library workers even define them? What happens to, well, a puberty book that might include nudity? Is it rated as inappropriate for young readers, its target audience, based on its content?

Self-created rating systems are also a liability for the library. More on that in a second.

Opt-In Forms

One big way that “parental rights” advocates have fought for guardrails in both public and school libraries is through permission forms. In Florida, opt-in and opt-out forms took hold even earlier during this rise in book banning than elsewhere. These forms allowed parents/guardians to decide whether their students could or could not have access to the library; they were, and continue to be, unpopular among the majority of parents. Most parents do not opt their children out of library access.

The language here is important. Opt-out forms mean that young people have access to the entire library or collection as the default. To restrict access, parents/guardians file a form to keep certain collections or the entire library from their student(s). This is not censorship, though in public libraries, it toes a fine line because public libraries do not operate in loco parentis (they often do in school libraries). The possible liability of accidentally checking out a book a parent has restricted or, worse, allowing a teenager to enter the adult collection for a reference book when that has been opted out by the parent is not small. This is especially true in states that are criminalizing librarians.

Opt-in forms are, without question, censorship. Opt-in forms start with everyone being denied the right to access books or the entire library. Only when a parent or guardian gives permission can young people then access all of or part of a collection. Even in public school libraries, opt-in forms are censorship. To begin with denial of access and require hurdles—the form getting home, the form getting signed, the form getting back to the library or administration—to get access is information suppression.

It doesn’t matter if you’ve always had an opt-out form, using that to become an opt-in form is censorship.

“Weeding”

This was covered in depth here, but “weeding” practices outside of the standard weeding are an easy and convenient way to censor materials. There’s the obvious book removal when titles are “weeded,” but “weeding” also can involve books being redacted or relocated.

Quiet/Soft/Silent Censorship

And of course, there’s the huge and wildly underreported issue of quiet/silent censorship. It’s called quiet/silent/soft because recording instances of books being reshelved without question or titles never being acquired out of disagreement with their contents or fear their contents might cause a stir is impossible. Who would want to admit to something that they feel shameful for engaging in?

It’s worth noting that not all who engage in quiet/soft censorship are ashamed of their decisions.

Without a solid grasp of how pervasive this form of censorship is, we’ll never know how bad library censorship truly is. But it is without question one of the most common forms of censorship that is also one of the least talked about.

There’s one more area of potential library censorship worth chewing over as well, in part because it comprises a real ethical quandary: what about a tiered system of library cards? Library cards with restrictions—that some cards allow access or borrowing of only certain materials for minors based on their parent/guardian’s choice—are in a censorship gray area. They aren’t blatant censorship unless young people can only access certain materials by parental opt-in. Giving parents the opportunity to opt out of those materials is the trickier part. Age-restricted library cards open up heaps of possible liability issues. They also suggest that the library believes that some people deserve full access while others do not, and it puts libraries in that parental/paternal role.

Often, though not always, the above policies and procedures are instituted with good intentions. But even the best of intentions in compromise can still be censorship.

Book Censorship News: August 30, 2024

Rounding out this week’s massive book censorship news update with this: EveryLibrary is hosting what looks to be an incredible Banned Books Week festival. EveryLibrary Live! Banned Books Week 2024 will feature almost 50 authors and First Amendment experts joining for 25+ free online panels and sessions the week of Sept 22-27. Get more information about the festival here and sign up to join.

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