Fixing and Making Things at the Library
I was a little girl's hero at the library when I fixed her fidget toy. She had a pink plastic fidget spinner on a strap like a wristwatch, and it had snapped off one of its lobes where it was thinnest next to the central hub bearing. Fortunately, it was a clean break with no apparent distortion of the plastic, and I had super glue on hand.
I was concerned it would break when reassembled, because it has a friction fit on the bearing, but the larger piece handled the majority of those stresses and it held together. I warned her I couldn't guarantee it wouldn't break again, but she was pleased as punch, declaring I could "fix anything."
We also rearranged our Young Adult corner of the library to make way for some shelving changes and make better use of our space. Well, I say "we," but Ms. A and the other Ms. A moved the books while I made new signs. I indulged in some creativity with various styles ranging from cartoony to retro neon to grungy punk rock 'zine, and the rest of the librarians helped me narrow down what worked until we had a consensus. I hope we're not too old and out of touch with what the youngsters think is cool. We'll see.
Unfortunately, there are also things I can't fix at the library.
Management seems to be resorting to micro-management, leading to tension and frustration throughout the district. It's making our jobs harder, but there is no communication about what problem it is all supposed to solve.
We also have escalating tensions with the moral crusaders who have convinced themselves libraries are part of a secret plan to turn the kids LGBTQ or something. Yes, we have LGBTQ materials. When a matter is in public discourse, the job of the library is to present all points of view so far as possible. We also try to carry as many new books as possible, and not censor any of what is being published. Let's also not forget that LGBTQ members of our community are also extorted to fund the library just like the evangelicals. No, there aren't secret drag queen story hours to turn the kids transgender. Besides, we aren't Portland or San Francisco.
The constant pressure from these busybody control freaks grates on our nerves, and the bureaucratic nonsense is just heaping more stress on us. It feels lonely at the circulation desk sometimes, as if we are under attack from all sides. I wish administrators and moral crusaders alike could see the reality of fixing a little girl's toy, finding classics for new readers, and providing a healthy social and educational environment for people of all ages. So if you have a library card, do something nice for our librarians. They're all likely in similar situations across the US, and perhaps around the world as well.
So the library actually allow LGBTQ materials
The library is for everyone, and there are some sex ed books which discuss LGBTQ relationships in a favorable light, fiction with LGBTQ characters/themes, and so forth. 7nfortunately, there are also people eager to demonize the library by magnifying these books as if they are part of an agenda, and accuse many more of being secretly gay or trans when they have no actual content like that.
This time it was your turn to be a hero without a cape for that little girl. We have to see the positive, so as not to live in torment. At least here, we went from a macho society to accept LGBTQ people and now they almost impose being LGBTQ. Children should be kept out of social influence.
Where would we be without super glue!
Have you noticed it not being so good these days though, the stuff here is a little more watery and takes ages to stick sometimes and it never used to.
It might be a ploy as they are now selling their more expensive syperglue gel nonsense which I have had to buy
I don't know how Scottish super glue works. Around here, it's available in a variety of consistencies with varying advertised set speeds. Some materials are just plain resistant to glue, too. Plastics in particular include families of polymers that simply shrug off adhesives. But I have bought a few glues that just seemed impossible to get to set, too.
We are a land poor in glues. I think I have seen the generic cheap stuff that is runny, then a couple of ones that are gels but that's it.
Might not have been looking that hard right enough, there's probably millions 😀
De verdad es un gran privilegio tener en estos días una biblioteca, cuando los jóvenes buscan e investigan todo por internet.
Obviously, you can’t fix all things even though the little girl felt that way
And there were even some things you could not fix in the library
The kids may have a new nickname for you now, the Library Hero! And if that brings them back more often, it must be a good thing!
So what happens in Portland and San Francisco? Libraries there actually have special activities for LGBTQ families?
By the way, we have a Worklife Community https://peakd.com/c/hive-195880/created, dunno if you're aware of it, you can post your work related post there. It's not very active at the moment but we'd like to bring it back when one the other founders come back from hiatus
Bigger cities like Portland, Oregon and San Francisco, California have events like drag queen story hour where local cross-dressers read books to children. Smaller communities with more conservative populations like mine generally do not. It would be a bad fit for everyone, staff and patrons alike.
There are books which actively support LGBTQ politics, relationships, and lifestyles or at least have LGBTQ characters, but these are few in number. Strangely, the people keeping these books in circulation and in the public consciousness are the people loudly denouncing libraries for having them.
They forget the Streisand effect and fail to realize that books which do not circulate are first on the chopping block whenever shelving is getting crowded. This particular type of conservative also accuses literally hundreds of perfectly innocent books of being homosexual and transgender propaganda, and also conflates Young Adult books with the children's section since the former is technically in part for teenagers as "pushing an agenda on minors."
I was unaware of that community. Would they object to cross-posting after the fact?
Thanks for the insight. It must be difficult to balance inclusion and diversity with respecting people's opinions and values.
We're pretty relaxed in Worklife, as long as it's workrelated but not a daily work diary where you do the same routine work every day 🥱. Cross posts are OK to answer your question 😀
I think we need a new rule to facilitate some poetic justice: anyone calling for censorship should be censored. Anyone who takes issue with what the library keeps on its shelves should be banned from the building. Those who want control should be controlled. Abusers should be abused. Take a page out of their playbook (Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals) and hold them to their own standards. It's not hypocrisy, it's hierarchy, and if they won't play by our rules, perhaps we should play by theirs. If I seem impatient, there's a good reason for that.
The busybody control freaks cannot refrain from sticking their abnormally large noses in other people's business. I joined Substack only a week ago, and that entire time, the Substackers Against Nazis (SAN) have been screeching about non-existent National Socialists because some huckster wrote about it in The Atlantic. What a time to join a new platform. I've already been blocked by one of these pearl-clutching fuckwits. Apparently, calling Nazi trolls "subhuman twats who provide endless entertainment" means that I support the NSDAP. I already told an interlocutor of the psychotic cyclops who blocked me to never apologise, and never allow these people to brow-beat you into compromise.
Teflon brains. Ideas won't stick. Facts and evidence have no impact. Anything said is distorted until they fit it into their preconception, no matter how much it must be mangled first. It's like trying to discuss geography with a flat earther, but these control freaks have political ambitions, too.
Well, you made one little girl's day,so it wasn't a wasted day, even if it might otherwise seemed as if it were. I wish the micromanagers and the Karens would just back off and leave the library alone. It was operating just fine before they started their was against whatever it is they think needs to be fought.
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Good job fixing it for the little girl! All in a days work man!
I can appreciate the predicament you’re in but also the ones the parents are in. I think what the problem is is that the drag queen story hour shit is over the top and we’ve seen quite a number of other insidious things going on from library and schools but the challenge is - it’s a global issue in the west and we are seeing it affect a few hundred thousand people in a geographical area. It’s like seeing a murder happen in Los Angeles on TV but you are living in port Charlotte Florida. It can feel like it’s on your doorstep but realistically it’s not.
I don’t know how we bridge the gap on the book stuff but it’s a considerably larger problem than we can solve at the micro level.
You also have to double check the claims. Is the content really what they say? For example, The Story of Ferdinand is now being accused of being secretly about THE GAYS. And is the book shelved in the picture book section or Young Adult? And are these parents teaching their kids to be discerning readers who respect the right of others to read what they want, or are they little control freaks who don't want their kids to think and don't want anyone else to live even slightly differently?
I would love to start a private subscription library with a collection curated for homeschoolers and libertarians. No government, no drama, just a bunch of cooperative bibliophiles seeking only truth and beauty. !BBH
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I have been thinking about writing a librarian's recommended reading list for fiction, and of course a collection on various non-fiction topics to enhance a basic curriculum is useful. Kids also love DIY books on arts and crafts. In my community, we have a lot of homeschoolers exploiting our wider district and network connections to pull books from across many counties though. Establishing a single library is fiscally daunting. Although not buying every James Patterson, Stephen King, Nora Roberts, and Danielle Steel book will save a chunk of change.
!CTP