From: James Elliott <j_c_elliott>
Date: Mon, 18 Jul 2005 16:45:44 -0400

Um, Norma (and all), A school board will listen to ANY group that has any kind of community support and can vote to cut funding or members out of office.

I know for a fact that there are many orgainzations that I might consider
'crackpot', but they have considerable sway in the community.

For example, we had a practice at a library at which I used to work, to put
'category' stickers on the spines of certain types of fiction: a dove for inspirational, a black cat for horror, a space-ship for sci-fi, a horse for westen, a rose for romance, Christmas tree for -- well, Christmas, and a pink triangle for gay-interest.

Well, one group was so horrified that we would choose to identify this last group that they went to the County Commission and complained! In short order we were ordered to remove ALL non?ll number idenifying labels from all books lest anyone be offended and persue a law suit against the county. Never mind that, for many of us, we felt that the ID had a secondary purpose of letting these people know which books they could avoid? at any rate, we in the field were outraged at this type of action and capitualation by the County Commission (and I'm a conservative!). But it was 'law' and so we had to abide by it if we wanted to continue receiving funding in full.

And there were other cases, by both conservative AND liberal groups with an axe to grind and chose to pick the library as their target, but that's enough for now.

There is a bumper sticker I LOVE that says:

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Truer words never spoken.

Jim Elliott Reference Librarian Gadsden County Public Library Florida
Received on Mon 18 Jul 2005 03:45:44 PM CDT