The opinions expressed in the below blog post are mine, and do not necessarily reflect the position of the MLA, MASL, or the MO-ACLU.
As a member of the MO House for the past seven years, I have to assume Cody Smith must know the true nature of the MLA, MASL, and MO-ACLU’s suit against SB 775. This post is not addressed to him, but to his constituents to whom he has mischaracterized the principled stance of Missouri’s library workers against censorship. I will keep it brief to provide clear and accurate information to readers, which is the role librarians play every day in the very libraries Smith is trying to defund. As with most censorship, the question of who defines terms and how is very important. To be clear: the MO-ACLU’s complaint against SB 775 is against a small part of the bill (Section 573.550) that makes librarians subject to criminal charges if they provide “explicit sexual material” to a student. This is a problem because presently the term “sexually explicit” is being misused in book challenges across the country. A book on reproductive health, for example, or a manga or graphic novel with a picture of a human body in it might be grounds for a class A misdemeanor if a librarian checks it out to a library user. Rick Brattin, who added 573.550 to SB 775, has been part of a series of incidents of this sort in his own district over the past year, around the book It’s Perfectly Normal.
As has been noted elsewhere, the MLA and MASL do not receive state funding. These are membership organizations that get their funding from individual member dues. The MO-ACLU is bringing the lawsuit on their behalf, pro bono. Cutting funding to libraries will not impact funding to the MLA, unless by doing so Smith intends to cause layoffs and mass exodus of librarians from the state of Missouri. Zeroed-out funding to libraries is a devastating prospect for librarians and the communities we serve. We love our communities and believe deeply in the importance of the work we do everyday. We believe that it is already clear to many watching Smith, Ashcroft and Brattin’s actions both within Missouri and nationally, that they are happy to undermine libraries, damage the public good, and block access to resources and services to make an obtuse political point.
When Smith attempts to remove funding from libraries, he and others like him damage the public good. Librarians are principled professionals standing up for our foundational ethics- intellectual freedom and access. In protesting SB 775 and other related actions by the state legislature, we are advocating for public access to information and against government overreach into the civil liberties of our users. We trust our users and the voters of Missouri to see through the transparently political actions by Smith and his pro-censorship colleagues to undermine the library as a public institution. Librarians are experts on intellectual freedom, knowledge organization, selecting materials and providing access to information. Smith as far as I can tell, is a businessperson and real estate agent, and Rick Brattin is a farmer and has a small construction company. Though they may wish otherwise, none of these experiences in any way qualifies them to tell librarians how to do their jobs.
See y’all in court!
Joe Kohlburn 