More scarce than a banned book?
The Obama nation; leftist politics and the cult of personality is a very scarce book in Ohio libraries, one of the most critical states in the election. At UAPL, there have been 18 requests for the one title that is circulating, and as near as I can tell from the record, there are 2 more copies in various stages of slowly, slowly dressing and primping to come out of the backroom and basement. God forbid that a library director or collection head should ever anticipate a need based on the cultural and social make-up of the community who pays her salary!Not much chance that these requests will be filled before the election, is there? Also, hundreds, maybe thousands of regular readers are like me and just don't place a hold when they see the line--it's no different than the line at the restaurant or bank. You just leave. But librarians have their rules. Yes, indeedy. 1) buy slowly when you have the magic number of requests you can't fill; and 2)quickly swamp your shelves with anti-Bush books, even the most obscure and non-reviewed.
Cuyahoga County Public Library (suburbs of Cleveland) has 31 copies, none of them available; Columbus Public Library owns 56 copies with 148 requests. Ohio State has zero copies, but that doesn't surprise me. I mean, young people don't vote, right? It tends to a 100 or so scholarly titles like Bush's brain, All the President's spin, and Bushwacked plus two titles on impeaching him in the Law Library and eleven lauditory titles about Obama.
Banned Books Week (BBW), sponsored by the useless American Library Association which has never been able to get librarians a middle-class wage, is coming up--last week in September. Remember, folks. It all starts with what isn't purchased, not with complaints from the library users. Librarians politically are more liberal than the ACLU, Hollywood, and MoveOn dot org combined. For every registered Republican librarian, there are 223 Democrat librarians to out-buy them. Library purchases are critical to the success of a title. The chances of a conservative book getting to the new bookshelves are slim to none unless you request it. And even then, the chances aren't good. Librarians would rather be left behind than choose right.
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11 comments:
As the other registered Republican librarian, I donated my copy of Obama Nation to my local library. It has been 13 days now and it is not in circulation but there are 21 reserves on it in our system.
And here I was going to suggest they send a page down to B&N, buy a copy, and slap a c.2 tag on it. Guess that wouldn't work.
Actually, when I checked their catalog, all 3 books are in circulation.
Also, the link you provided is wrong. Assuming, of course, you were trying to direct us to the Upper Arlington Public Library (www.ualibrary.org).
Perhaps you owe the UA public library an apology? Although I have my doubts that where this is concerned that they could do anything right unless it was to immediately put a copy into the hands of every person who had placed a hold. Maybe even deliver them individually to each residence.
Thank you for pointing out the bad link--I was working from memory, and that uapl thingy went somewhere else. No conspiracy. Are you disappointed? I've been placing requests there for many years and I know the ropes and what gets purchased and what doesn't. My hold has been there since early August when there was one copy; when I inquired last week on its status, I was told there were 3 copies. I looked and as near as I could tell from what is obvious to the public (and you seem to have inside information) 2 of the 3 copies were not available for holds. This could have changed the next minute when I moved on. I'm happy to hear the log jam has been broken for the 16 or so waiting to read the book.
No inside information, when you look at the holding status (as of yesterday)... 1 is currently being held, they other two are checked out - which is why they have due dates.
I don't even live remotely close to UAPL, and have no inside information. I just garnered that information off of their online public catalog. Perhaps the catalog in library shows different information?
So, a serious question, what do you think the ratio should be between reserves and copies? Currently it's at around 3:1 (as of yesterday, 16 reserves, 3 copies). I think as a rule, and this has been true since I've been working in libraries, we do not provide, necessarily, instant gratification for specific titles. Otherwise we'd become bookstores. Do you have a different idea of what the correct ratio should be?
Many libraries use the ratio plan. For an election year, if I were the head, I'd take a look at my community, it's voting record, and just take a risk and try to keep the public reading.
UAPL is a very rich library. It could buy one less coffee table book on movies or one less jazz CD or print one or two fewer full color, bulletin board sized posters promoting scrap booking or air guitar and boldly buy something conservative. Or they could buy fewer Bush bashing books. Just a thought.
I think you've been a librarian long enough to know that we can never make everyone happy. Or every Jazz CD they don't buy, or one less coffee table book, there will be a patron complaining because they money is going to books about politics which they don't care about. It's a balancing act, and certainly they could drop everything to buy the titles that would make you happy. But then they'd be doing a disservice to the rest of their patrons.
However, if you want an example of imbalance, did you think to look at how many anti-McCain books UA carries? Of 4 titles I quickly (so I may have missed some) indentified, UA owns 1 (Free Ride) - and only 1 copy. Of the two anti-Obama titles I found, UA owns both - and 3 copies of both.
Using your logic, I'd have to come to the conclusion that UA is very pro-McCain, and very anti-Obama. Six to one? C'mon, why haven't they bought the other anti-McCain titles ( The Real McCain, McCain: They Myth of a Maverick, and Gook: John McCain's Racism and Why It Matters)? Why did they jump all over the anti-Obama titles and not do the same for the anti-McCain titles?
Perhaps they are more aware of their community than you give them credit for.
And a brief update - Ohio State doesn't carry any of the anti-McCain books either.
Perhaps you might consider that there is less partisanship on the part of librarians than you claim. And, as far as I could tell, there are still quite a few books bashing the Clinton administration on the shelves at UA - and he hasn't been president in nearly 8 years. I don't think it is uncommon to have a lot of books critical of a sitting President. That seems to be the nature of the beast.
If you're going to make a claim of lop-sided collection development, particularly of a political nature, I think you're going to need better facts than what you've presented.
I think your being way to hard on librarians. They go to colleges with liberal professors, they choose a low paying career which probably makes them dependent minded rather than independent, or at least mad at successful people, the jobs they get are always at risk if they upset someone, most of the books are liberal and so are the reviewers and there are hardly any conservative publishers. So where is this balance going to come from? They're doing the best they can with some slim pickings.
LOL.. yeah.. I'm mad at people who make more money than me. And gosh, yes, since I got my liberal arts education, I just don't know how to think independently. I just baaaa my way through the day.
Our jobs are not at risk if we upset someone. Otherwise all librarians would be fired on a nearly weekly basis. Our jobs are at risk if we deliberately and continually upset our patrons by not providing the services that they pay for.
While my pay is lower than a lot of people, there are still even more that earn less than I do. I'm very aware of that, and I don't complain. Much. ;)
Honestly, just because I see things differently than you, doesn't mean that you're an independent thinker and I'm not - which is certainly implied by what you wrote.
I took my job because I like having a job where I work around books, where I can actually help people and frequently make a small difference in their lives. When I go home at night, I'm very content and happy with my life. And, I don't sit there and fret about people who make more than I do.
Most publishers are neither liberal or conservative... most print what will sell. What that says about the general population I'll leave up to your active imagination.
Perhaps, although I doubt it's true, liberals are more likely to buy books or patronize a library? It makes as much sense as some of the other conclusions I've seen,and certainly is based on no flimsier evidence than I've seen cited.
I might suggest that you do a little research and perhaps ask some questions before you jump to such huge and erroneous assumptions.
But thanks for the post, it brought a smile.
Although I disagree with you that publishers are neither liberal nor conservative (there are many more liberal titles churned out on the non-fiction side, don't read fiction so don't know about that), I agree that librarianship is one of the best jobs in the world--just one of the poorest paid that requires an advanced degree. And in my experience, everyone thinks she is an original and independent thinker--it's always the other guy/girl that's following the crowd.
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