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Archive for the ‘censorship’


“A good library has something to offend everyone”

Kim Antieau has written an open letter to the library board of the Fort Vancouver Regional Library to express her anger over the board’s decision to filter the internet on the libary’s computers. It seems as though (although it isn’t explicitly clear in the letter) that the decision was taken in the hopes of getting in return, funding for new library buildings. It sounds like something the Free Range Librarian said yesterday on her blog:

Well, you know what we’re told on ALA Council: it’s a “win” if it doesn’t disrupt library funding.

CLA denounces censorship of photo exhibition

From an earlier post about supposedly “pro-palestinian” photos that were taken down from a library exhibit in Côte-St-Luc in Montreal, the CLA has issued a press release asking the Côte-St-Luc council members to reverse its decision to remove the “offending” pictures.

While CLA respects that a public institution is free to set its own policies, CLA notes the library deemed the exhibit worthy enough to display in the first place. In doing so, it was quite properly fulfilling its role as a centre for freedom of expression, intellectual discussion and debate within its community. It was doing what a library should.

CLA urges the Côte-St-Luc council to support its library as a place where an open exchange of ideas and opinions are encouraged, rather than a place where criticism is dealt with by censorship, by re-opening the full exhibit.