Dear Editors:
My career has spanned some 40+ years as a librarian and library instructor, educator in two disciplines, and musician. My career has crossed between traditional and non-traditional. My work with the U.S. Air Force was non-traditional in maintaining a very small core collection necessary for developing, with database management practices, information about software engineering literature and the R&D projects to support military efforts in maintaining, during the Cold War, radar systems training simulators, and any type of equipment in support of aviation and for any branch of the military. The career path for me also went into years as a corporate librarian for R&D, executive management, engineering, and marketing, concentrated in the training department of the corporation. My career also kept me, practically all that time, in the academic field and in public libraries.
I have been a member of the Special Librarians Association (SLA, both Upstate New York and Florida & Caribbean chapters), American Society for Information Science (ASIS), Edison Electric institute (EEI) Library Division, American Library Association (ALA), Association for College and Research Libraries (ACRL), Freedom to Read Foundation (FTRF), and state organizations, such as Florida Library Association (FLA), Florida chapter of ACRL, and New York Library Association.
In this career with professional groups, I have been an elected leader of groups and attended many conferences. Add to this my organizing of conferences in Florida, including a technology conference for libraries held in Miami Beach and working with the keynote speaker, Jamie LaRue, who eventually moved on to head the FTRF.
I have experience working with public libraries and the Florida statewide advocates of public libraries, including Bernadette Storck and others in the NEFLIN, TBLC, and SEFLIN library cooperatives.
Why do I have to explain these credentials? Because your newspaper publishes an article by Stanley Kurtz who appears to be from a conservative think tank and is critical of the very profession from where spent these many years. But all he has to do is be identified with POLITICS and POLITICAL IDEOLOGY and he is thus an “expert.” In the Air Force, we used to say that “an expert is a drip under pressure.” The rest of us in the professions are ignored and never get our material printed or published, especially if we worked in an academic area which does not place a requirement of “publish or perish” to appear on the shingle. That was the academic area where I worked as a professor and library instructor for 25 years of my career. No requirement for “publish or perish,” so I was ignored when I attempted to publish. Except for one time and it was by a publisher in a FOREIGN NATION under the BRITISH COMMONWEALTH. But not in American academics.
In light of all of this and the goofball chosen to write about “the soul of the library,” I also must add that my reading repertoire, since I was in the 7th Grade, has been across the board in terms of political spectrum. I read George Will as well as Paul Krugman or others. I never felt I had to massage my ego by only reading (or viewing on political analysis television) only what made me happy. “We’ll have fun, fun, fun til our daddy takes the T-bird away.” That was NOT my mantra. I also viewed CONSERVATIVE William F. Buckley, Jr. with his program called Firing Line. I would read Buckley’s op-ed columns, too and had an interest in his magazine called The National Review. I ALSO had an interest in the liberal publication, The New Republic, which challenged positions taken in the Buckley magazine.
Political ideology means nothing to me. My mantra is about humanism first. I don’t consider the Civil Rights Act nor the Voting Rights Act, from the 1960s, to be pertinent for politics because they concern humanist attitudes in the way we treat one another as human beings in a democracy. But alas, what choice do we have and LBJ was forced to force the American people to take a good long look at those two acts. What a shameful thing to say about America. But we had to come to grips with these issues, even if many of us merely define what we stand and pledge of allegiance to a flag, while too many people are nothing but hypocrites. “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Now we have atheists who likely prioritize more the removal of “one nation under God…” (1950s addition under President Eisenhower) than to endorse and inspire that we follow the words, “with liberty or justice for all.” Or, such people don’t take and prioritize standing up for “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Too many people are thinking on individualist terms, working to destroy. Such people do this, whether Trump, atheists, or the “woke librarians” identified by Kurtz.
This might be a problem. The bigger problem I have with Kurtz is his stereotyping of librarians as all of us being these “liberal” or “woke” librarians. What an insult. I have offered my credentials and must say that, should Kurtz not conclude that I am a “woke” librarian, he is a shameful and mentally deranged person who needs a lobotomy.
Issue. Censorship. Kurtz says that too many librarians put the 1619 Project book into the library, but don’t add Peter Wood’s 1620 book. Excuse me, Mr. Kurtz, but in your bias towards conservatism, you lump us all together as being people who don’t put books from a balanced view into a library. How insulting of the man.
And Kurtz’s stupefying idiocy continues with the phrase, “traditional ideas of liberty.” WHAT? So being a humanist, I ignore traditional ideas of liberty because I don’t like them to be tailored to white supremacists? It is not questions of liberty, just as much as it’s not a question of politics. It is how we treat our fellow human beings. So Mr. Kurtz can go stuff his bias where the sun don’t rise. He is insulting to good people in America.
Take this even further. A university in Florida and a college in Michigan where conservatism prevails over liberal. The one in Florida is a very large one, too. Yet, those in Florida who must believe in white racist forms of “liberty” which should prevail over all, makes claims that the university in Florida has too damn many liberal professors. Really? I have spoken with graduates of that university and they speak about conservative professors who cram their ideas down their throats.
What about conservative MIT? It has engineers who look the other way regarding global warming and claim it does not exist. They put out fake stuff in this regard, ignoring the facts so as in the Trumparian way, they put their own spin on the issue. Meanwhile, sea levels are rising in Florida and some are fearful of the levels becoming too high. Hopefully, this never happens during our lifetime.
But what about words in the preamble to the U.S Constitution? “Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity…” Posterity? Does Kurtz even realize that this is a LIBERAL, PROGRESSIVE THOUGHT about our descendants, not some asinine traditional thought about “traditional ideals of liberty.” Being the conservative and disgusting anti-humanist Kurtz demonstrates that he is.
In reading this Kurtz article, I am struck by his statements to stereotype all librarians as liberal and where he gets his proof and evidence of this? In America today, there are too many who simply speak off the cuff and never provide detailed evidence. Kurtz speaks about an ALA conference as if it is mush to not be considered. Let me see. So, the ALA conference I once attended about 2007 was nothing but mush and no one spoke there except “liberals?” Funny, but I find the man with a mentally deranged mind in saying such a thing. I suppose that Julie Andrews speaking at an ALA conference means she is nothing but a liberal? Where is Kurtz’s damn proof of this? Julie Andrews did not speak about politics. She spoke about her work with writing childrens’ books and working with childrens’ theatre. This is “liberal,” you damn SOB, Kurtz? What a lousy thing to say about someone who spends her time, since losing her voice due to a surgery which went sour. I applaud her for her performances on Broadway and in The Sound of Music. I suppose Kurtz just cannot handle the fact that Julie Andrews also appeared in Victor Victoria? What a dolt and scumbag.
Yes, Bobby Kennedy, Jr., spoke at that conference. Big deal. A liberal with whom no liberals even pay attention to him, particularly in the Democratic Party. But he is stereotyped and smeared by Kurtz?
Some of the others who appeared at that 207 ALA conference and I don’t recall who was there. But I KNOW they were not all liberal and there were a number of conservatives, too. Perhaps the liberals outnumbered conservatives? But when I don’t consider ideology to be important, I would not even pay attention.
In a later ALA conference, I heard a black man speak on a HUMANIST topic, describing growing up in Michigan in the late 1950s and being force to carry Mason jars in the car so they could pee while traveling. Why? Because of gas stations and other lavatory facilities where only white people were accepted. In other words, hold your pee if you have color on your skin. So, this guy, speaking about historical accounts of Jim Crow-like attitudes among whites in America and he is a liberal? More like Kurtz and others are as shameful about all the things which happened and wishes to keep it covered over. He is being like a teacher who had sex with young girls and wished to keep it hidden and out of sight. Such people are mentally deranged sickos. And there are some issues for which I find this black man to be a tad on the conservative side. But he is not liberal just because he stands up for human rights. He is called a human being.
Kurtz says, “Librarians should be politically neutral. Too many aren’t.” Maybe I could say, “Writers accepted for publication in the New York Times should be politically neutral. Too many aren’t.” I have no proof this statement is accurate because I don’t bother to count.
Perhaps Mr. Kurtz needs to learn by reading a series of books written by the Librarian of Congress, Dr. Daniel J. Boorstin. Dr. Boorstin wrote a a series of books titled The Americans. One book had the sub-title of The Democratic Experience. Dr. Boorstin was appointed by Republican CONSERVATIVE, Ronald Wilson Reagan. I suppose Mr. Kurtz would consider a chapter in Boorstin’s book about how a 19th-Century Massachusetts Insurance Commissioner exposed the corruption in the life insurance industry and made changes to it. Too liberal for Mr. Kurtz because he supports corruption and one is liberal if one takes on corruption? Explain this to me because Kurtz stereotypes all librarians as “not being neutral” and as being “liberal.” Wrong, even if he says, “too many aren’t [neutral].”
Also added to this discussion is the reporting of a conversation with someone of the FTRF. We did have a somewhat contentious argument because I felt there needed to be a moderation of what gets published or warning notes and disclaimers, or other methods of moderating the content or else we need to consider censoring books like the one Timothy McVeigh read in order to make bombs. The person at FTRF stood staunchly behind the position of lawyers at the ACLU and protecting books from being censored. But that was only one example. Kurtz makes it sound like there are dozens and dozens and dozens of such examples. Even then, the discussion did center on my suggestions as to how to tone it down when it came to consideration of censorship or not.
Then there is the librarian in Florida who told about a local evangelical fundamentalist church which came to the library and insisted the director toss out any books which contained stories of sex or violence. The director took this group to the shelves, pulled Bible after Bible off the shelves and tossed them in a waste can. The group shrieked in dismay! “How can you throw out all of those Bibles!” The library director said, “well, you asked me to throw out all books which contained stories about sex and violence, so that is where I am beginning. Now show me the other books.” The churchy folks simply departed without another word.
Furthermore, there are those who believe the Koran (Islam) should be removed. Likely Rick Santorum would like to see such a book removed. Yet, this book has no content promoting violent terrorism. Muslims tailored to Saudi Arabia (ISIS, Taliban, and what not) mis-use documents like that the same way that many who call themselves Christians do with the Bible. Most notably, the Southern Baptists once changed the Bible to make it fit their white supremacy ideas.
This question Kurtz poses presents many aspects about life and for all of us living together. Yes, perhaps if 1619 Project is in a library, perhaps Wood’s book, 1620 should be there. But even then, I really am opposed to having any book with hatred and promotion of white supremacist ethnic, religious, or sexual identity bigotry should be allowed in a library. The litmus test should be about humanism. Historical humanism reports on the good and the bad. I have no idea about a comparison of either 1619 Project or 1620, so I cannot comment. But if either one does not live up to the standards of humanism and a lack of hatred and bigotry, I would not choose one which is based on such content. Does Kurtz have specific details and examples for either of these books? If so, I would thrilled to discover what the content is about. And that is how I approached my collection development activities at a library. I was assigned religion, philosophy, music, art, and literature areas, plus areas related to these subjects. For some subject areas, such as philosophy, students often took an interest, so I would speak with them and consult with the philosophy professors. Thank goodness I was never assigned the political science area of the collection!
As a retired librarian and educator, this article by Kurtz insults and irks me. Oh, well, who cares because I am not that important, right? It provides little information with proof and evidence for what Kurtz makes a claim about my profession.
Tioga Herald 
Culture Vultures & Private Equity Buying up America’s Newspapers
Dear Editors:
Since 2005, America’s local newspapers “have been struggling” with “roughlyy 2200 of them” folding. .
The conclusions are two-fold, apparently. Private-equity firm buyouts of newspapers might be the answer, but it is totally from a “business perspective.” From an information and journalism standpoint, there is evidence that the move from local news and information by private-equity firm buyouts has tended to cause more polarization in America. People reading national news rather than the local news is attributed for the polarization we can observe every day. This is the feedback we are reading from, as, at the end of The Economist informative article says, “expert analysis.” We called experts as being “drips under pressure,” so I am not impressed.
This is a complex issue which needs to be researched in more detail. But then again, who cares, right? Who cares that the nation is polarized. Seems to me this is more important than the “business perspective.” However, there are better ways to solve this problem for both problems, than just closing down local news which polarizes America. If the number of people seeking local news has declined, then perhaps we need to determine the reasons WHY?
Locally, there is one reason I can observe. Living in a rural county, there is no daily newspaper which provides good coverage for this area, as there was when I was delivering the Binghamton newspaper which is now a part of Gannett, but was not when I delivered the newspaper here.
With this being said, I have to also compare the “business perspective” to the movements under Reagan’s dereglation plans which placed most of business into merger & acquisition (M&A) which caused the loss of many jobs. I hate to say this, but most of those M&A things were done by wealthy Republicans. I lost my job, due to this. I know someone who worked 33 years for a newspaper who lost his job and the partial responsibility for that, in 2008, was M&A within the industry. The writer of this article seems to believe the losses came before the layoffs. But we have observed, as with M&A and layoffs in the utility industry, the decline happened due to money spent on operations other than for human beings, but for technology. For instance, I observed, in Florida, newspaper clipping “morgues” destroyed by costly digital replacements of the “morgues.” For years, such “morgues” were the archives for a newspaper and did not cost as much to maintain. But the “experts” here did not describe this, did they? It’s great that we have Newspapers.com as archival sources of newspapers, but what is available in local content? Nothing. So what kind of return on investment did we actually receive? I don’t know, but I can figure this in a cost-benefit analysis. A cost-benefit analysis was required of me when I automated a corporate library. The CFO was very tough in proving the return on investment for the company. As a result, the company was a “cash cow” and wealthy fat pigs looked at it as ripe for the picking, not due to the production and services it provides in a capitalist supply and demand economic situation. That CFO retired and the “culture vultures,” primarily young Republicans, swooped right in. Then we faced layoffs. I would wager that if people actually looked in detail at what happened with daily newspapers, one would find a very similar situation.
Competition and/or regulation keeps prices low and makes for better products and services. The liars in the Republican ranks which took over the company where I worked, tried to sell everyone on the idea of “creating competition” by eliminating regulation of utilities. Liars, liars, pants on fire. Because what happened was M&A which led to unregulated companies which were regulated by their own business community, not the government. Things had worked quite well before that time, even if things were not perfect at times.
Competition among only those at the high centralized level, as a result of M&A in the utilities and M&A in newspapers and media, by way of unregulated monopolies has reduced competition. The two newspapers which existed when I delivered newspapers as a kid, one Gannett and one locally owned, gave local people a better choice. The locally owned one published op-eds from conservative William F. Buckley, Jr., plus many others which some might say were more liberal. With both newspapers, the ownership had to clamour to do the best it could to sell newspapers locally, rather than looking from the eyes of a satellite in the sky or from the position of a Pravda centrally controlled newspaper as in communist Soviet states. You want a polarized nation? Well then you support a dictatorial Trump who will lead us into a position where we execute those who do not agree, as is done by Putin.
This article in The Economist, sad to say, does not take into consideration economics of capitalism with a supply and demand mentality. I am surprised that no one does. To conclude that “private equity” M&A with a centralized economics “may be helping more than it’s hurting” is really a lainbrained excuse. The claim that it works but only from the “business perspective.” This means, in today’s world, business has no sense of morality and is predominantly run by lovers of money by people who sit at very high positions with plenty of money, power and control. As a newspaper delivery people in Binghamton as kids, we had those who we attempted to compete with because there were two newspapers. My entire work for the Sun-Bulletin was about beating out the bigger circulation guys at the Gannett Evening Press. Gannett was the GOliath, so to speak. But I was able to increase the number of people to whom I sold the little Sun-Bulletin. I would bet I increased my numbers near five-fold. Some might say I am exaggerating. But in the end, I increased my numbers of readers on the east side of the village. It was a number to surpass the Gannett delivery people with routes where the east side of the village was divided into about two or three routes. Had I remained longer, we may have been able to see the Sun-Bulletin route divided into two parts. I know. I was a “newsie” who would sometimes substitute for the boys of the Gannett competitor.
The competition was at the local level, not at the pie-in-the-sky level, as is today. In fact, all of the “newsies” of those days had a capitalist business model which has been destroyed over those years in which the “expert” writing this article proclaimed “the decline of the newspaper industry.”
One local newspaper today is looking for delivery people. A one-page advertisement reads: “Peddling papers isn’t what it used to be…carriers earn $800 to $1200 a month! Plus generous tips!” EARN… not “make money in a business…” Wages. Salaries. Not entrepreneurship as in the days when I delivered newspapers here. I purchased the newspapers in a large bulk at a wholesale price. I had to make sure I sold them all at the retail price which was on the front cover. I was not a risk-taker, so I ordered according to the number of customers to whom I delivered. But there are some guys who, with ambitious goals as entrepreneurship, could purchase more and attempt to sell more, beyond those to whom I delivered. Yup! Today, it “isn’t what it used to be” when people are given wages and not learning how to run business.
THIS stuff today is SOCIALISM but without a government to control the socialism. Socialism is “nationalized” business. The ones doing the nationalizing are not the government, but are those in the centralized control and power and with a love of money. Yet, it is promoted by Republicans, the ones who yell and scream about socialism and they are so ignorant about what socialism really is. In fact, these folks do not even know what true capitalism with SUPPLY and DEMAND, INVESTMENTS AND RETURN ON INVESTMENTS over the long term. They deregulated banks so we ended up with financial situations in which we don’t save and invest for the long term, but grab credit cards instead. And they have also created an environment in which you cancel a credit card and your mince meat. All of this destruction of long-term investment means that homes in some areas increase very quickly, for the sake of greedy, selfish, money-lovers with their instant gratification. Homes in the 1980s increased over four to six years at a rate of, maybe, about 1% over those years. Beginning in the 2000s under Jebbie in Florida and Shrub in the White House, we viewed increases in housing prices about 125% over that same period of time. We saw homelessness increase in South Florida. And we witnessed the decline of the newspapers, as outlined by the writer of this article about “culture vultures” in the form of centralized wealthy fat pigs with their goons of lawyers and accountants doing a nasty job on America.
In the 11th grade history class, we learned that “those who control the media control the minds of the people.” THis article points out the divide and conquer method being used by the Putin and Trump types at the top with their forced dictatorships and puting away anyone who disagrees. The fat that ridding us of local news has polarized Americans really does raise the eyebrows of consideration when the local news is pulled out. There is a locall weekly newspaper here in Tioga COunty. There is also a weekly “pennysaver” press here in Tioga County. But monopoly Gannett does a lousy job in carrying the news of Tioga County on a daily basis. When there were two newspapers from Binghamton, they competed, trying to see who could do the best. I know. I viewed it.
In addition, there was competition for who could provide the best “cultural” information about this region. Many times, the Press would win. But The Sun-Bulletin could sometimes step up to the plate and hit a good run.
There are also solutions, from the business perspective. The money made in newspapers and not even mentioned by the “expert writing this article, is primarily from advertising, not the money charged for subscriptions for readers. It costs money to be able to increase home technology to pertinent levels to be able to read newspapers over a cup of coffee, by way of technology. It is difficult for the visually impaired to read digital copies, unless the technology is vastly improved. So. You want digital delivery? Pay a subscription. You want a print copy? No cost to the subscription. I have actually seen this method work successfully at a Florda newspaper, especially with arrangements on a college campus. The newspapers were gone very quickly. So much for those who claim “no one, especially the younger crowd, reads newspapers.” Sorry to say that, but that is bullshit. And the writer of this article never even considered what free print copies could do. For in this way, the newspaper can claim a larger circulation and thus be able to charge for the advertising, reaching people who might advertise and who would never do so otherwise. Either the price of the advertising could increase or the number or advertisers would increase. Perhaps bost things would happen. As long as newspapers INSIST on paying a wage for delivery folks, then why charge a price for the newspaper? The old-fashioned way was that “newsies” earned their money from PROFITS. OMG! Did I say something terrible with the word, “PROFITS?” How gross and perverted to use such a word. With a profit, too, it allows the “newsies” to determine how to cut overhead costs in order to bring in more profits, especially when gasoline prices are exorbitant. With a wage, they cannot do that.
Bottom line. Let us work to stop the polarization in America. Let us do things like bring back local control of newspapers and media, small local business which often worked by way of selling a product and not nickel and diming folks with the service provided (sometimes not, too – I don’t say this is an endall when there are too many people who do business and don’t follow 18th Century Adam Smith’s ideas for “moral sentiments”).
Category:
Commentary, Economics, Regulated Capitalism, Commerce, Journalism & Media