Don't read this!

We received an email from a person in another state who was dismayed that there was a list on our catalog named "Books parents should not let their children read". The email-er even copied and pasted the American Library Association (ALA)'s Bill of Rights to support her dismay. The response from one of our librarians was, in my opinion, a master class in kindness and restraint, especially given that keeping the list (which was created by an individual, not a librarian) available, as abhorrent as it may have been to us personally, was exactly the kind of intellectual freedom that the ALA Library Bill of Rights upholds. The librarian thanked the person for her concern and then patiently explained: 

"The list to which you are referring is a user-generated list, which was created by an individual. Bibliocommons (the library catalog that we use) allows individuals to create and share lists. You will find lists, tags, and reviews from a multitude of library users throughout the country and Canada. (This particularly list was created in 2011 before the Tulsa City-County Library used Bibliocommons.) ... Of course, we embrace intellectual freedom and encourage families to make their own, personal decisions about materials they select. This list is the opinion of a library customer, not an official library bibliography."
Laura, associate librarian

Have you ever noticed that your most vehement disagreements are often with people who generally agree with you, and vice versa?

It's true for me, at least. The person I probably argue with the most is my own father, and we are pretty much in sync in our opinions about politics, books, movies, and Bob Dylan. It doesn't stop us from bickering about all of those things -- until someone else in our family (usually my sister) says, "Hey, you're actually both saying the same thing!"

I think there was something of this too-close-for-peace going on in this particular interaction. The email-er was actually a teen librarian, and she was rightly horrified to think that a library would create such a list as "Books parents should not let their children read."That misunderstanding, coupled with an attempt to tell us about something we already knew (that the ALA Bill of Rights condemns censorship and supports the right to a variety of expressed opinions), created a friction that would probably not have existed had we received an email from someone completely opposed to intellectual freedom -- a parent wanting us to withdraw certain books from our collection, for example.

Why do I include this as a small good thing?

Because the Tulsa librarian's response could have easily been righteously cutting and curt (is there anything more annoying than someone telling you something you know good and well?!!??), but she took the high road in such a way that the response back was positive and supportive. No feelings were hurt, and the end result was two librarians supporting each other in the fight for free and equal access to all ideas and opinions, including ones that call for, ironically, silencing other ideas and opinions.