It doesn’t matter except in terms of legality. If the end result was that Palin was trying to get certain books banned, or install someone more amenable to book-banning, she’s a friend of thought control and an enemy of free speech.
All very nice and all, but Emmons was not the Librarian. She was the "city’s library director " a poltical appointee who served at the will of the Mayor. She does not seem to have been a professional Librarian, altho of course she may have had a degree in that field. She was a politician, not a professional; a appointee, not a civil servant. Emmons was the person to whom the “real” Librarian reported to, apparently, and Emmons reported to, and was appointed by- the Mayor.
Palin’s political foe did a pretty good job of this swiftboat attack. She called Emmons a Librarian- giving the impression of a non-political civil servant, whearas Emmons was a politcal appointee who served at the whim of the mayor. She said Emmons was fired- Emmons wasn’t. She implied it had somthing to do with Book banning but she’s the only person who apparently remembers that incident- it wasn’t in the local paper, or in Minutes, meeting notes, a Memo or even a email. The firing letter was given to Emmons due to the fact that Emmons had very publically supported Palin’s foe in the election. After Emmons and Palin met, and Emmons compromised by agreeing to merge the museum and Library dept (and likely to stop attacking Palin publically) then Emmons wasn’t fired after all. No “firestorm” no “public outcry” just a meeting between the two and a little compromise.
So “Palin fired librarian over refusal to ban books” is every word a lie, a perfect swiftboat.
This was a pure 100% swiftboat attack. You guys fell for it.
There is no evidence at all the Palin was trying to get any books banned. The firing had nothing at all to do with “book banning” the only one who remembers anything about book banning is a political foe of Palin. There is nothing whatsoever to support it.
I wonder if all those in this thread who are of the opinion that decisions should be left to the Librarian, because they’re the ones with the training, would agree with that. I doubt it. It seems to change things completely.
What part of “Library Director” is librarian jargon for the person that used to be called the “Head Librarian” don’t you understand? To say she was not a “librarian” is absurd.
And I repeat, a new mayor firing a librarian for any reason other than poor performance or gross negligence is borderline criminal. You keep ignoring the fact that a community outcry led the librarian to be rehired. Whatever the reason for her firing, it obviously was without merit as Palin rehired her without a fight.
Right. At this point, we’ll probably never know if Palin was asking if there was a policy in place to remove objectionable books or if Palin was asking to ban books. One is acceptable, the other is not.
A town of 9,000 people had a Library Director AND a Librarian? Wow. I grew up in a town three times that size and we didn’t even have a Library (outside of the one in the elementary school) - the next town over had one - it was run by one woman and only open about 40 hours a week.
I’m not talking about or advocating banning anything. My point is that many/most books will have to be excluded. And someone has to make the determination as to which books will be in the collection. should the collection reflect the tastes of the Librarian or the Community. I think we’ve established that no two collections will be alike, so who should have the final word. Again I refer you to my hypothetical:
If the Librarian in South Miami moves to Harlem and tries to create the same perfectly acceptable collection she had there, is not the community within it’s rights to replace her?
Becuase in this case, she wasn’t a Head librarian, she was a poltical appointee- what aprt of Dept head POLITICAL APPOINTEE SERVING AT THE WILL OF THE MAYOR don’t you understand?
She had every right to fire any position that served at the will of the mayor, they were Political appointees. Not civil servants.
Nor was there any “community outcry”. There was a meeting between the two and a compromise. Palin did not go through with her intent to fire letter as Emmons met with Palin and agreed to a compromise. No outcry, no “rehired”. Read the cite dammit.
No, again, you aren’t reading the cites. The Wasila library (system) served a population of 24,000 people in 1996 with one MLS-holding librarian and three librarians total. Emmons was a poltical appointee on the mayor’s board, who supervised the library, museum, and other things. She was not any of those 4 Librarians. I doubt if she even had a degree in Library science. The “MLS-holding librarian” is the person you dudes are thinking of as the civil servant “Librarian” , and of course that position would not be one that Palin could fire.
And what is the evidence that Palin sought to do so? The recollections of a single political foe years after the fact. No meeting minutes, no public or private records of any sort.
Folks, regardless of your stance on Ms. Palin, you’ve got to have stronger evidence than that.
The mayor is her direct supervisor, but that does not make her a “political appointee.” I serve at the pleasure of my Branch Manager, does that mean she can fire me because I like horror movies (and purchase them for the collection) and she doesn’t? She may have had the legal right, but what she did was CLEARLY (there’s that word again) wrong.
And I did read the cite (I posted the damn thing after all). The compromise meeting was preceded by an angry community reaction to Palin’s office and other city council members:
The part I don’t understand is where you’re getting this from. As far as I can tell you’re basing all this on a misunderstanding of what the term “Library Director” means. Perhaps I’ve missed some crucial link here, but nothing I’ve read about this case indicated that Emmons was not a librarian and your claims are inconsistent with what I know of how public libraries operate.
Granted I am not an expert on public libraries (I am an academic librarian) and small towns have their quirks, so if you’ve got an actual cite here I’d be happy to read it.
Now who’s using facts that aren’t in evidence? The fact is that Emmons was serving as the President of the Alaska Library Association when Palin fired her. I highly doubt she didn’t have an MLS.
Also, there were three librarians, not four. Please try to keep up.
Because it’s flat wrong. Just because you can be fired by a elected official doesn’t make you a “political appointee.” A library director is never a “political” position, regardless of how they are hired and fired. And yes, library director == head librarian. It’s the same damn thing.
Not as long as she adds all books that the community requests or donates. If she’s removing or banning books, then off she goes. You can keep on swapping code words for ethnicities all you want, it isn’t going to change the answer. Book banning is censorship and anyone who supports it is an enemy of the first amendment.
It’s a lot easier than some people here would have you believe.
If Hugh Hefner were actually a librarian then his library wouldn’t really be full of nothing but “gentleman’s magazines”, because if Hugh Hefner were the sort of person who wanted to be a librarian, went through library school, and got a job at a public library, he wouldn’t be the same Hugh Hefner we all know about. Not even close.
It might be amusing to imagine The Hef or Bill O’Reilly or any other unlikely figure being suddenly dropped into the role of small town librarian, but this kind of game doesn’t tell us anything about how libraries function in reality.
If the question is how people with strong opinions manage as librarians, then the answer is they do it by drawing a distinction between their personal views and their public duty and by reminding themselves that their job is to provide a variety of information to the public. People in other professions have to deal with things they dislike or disapprove of as part of their jobs, it’s not an issue unique to librarianship.
How many calls is “several”? Six? Seven? I’m sure that most of us could get six or seven outraged friends and relatives to make some irate telephone calls.
Mind you, I’m not saying that there was no public outcry. I’m just urging people not to jump to conclusions. I’d want to see some hard facts and more specific numbers before concluding that there was some massive upwelling of community support for the employee in question.
I’m not using code words. I was explicit about those communities in a previous post. Now the point is that if she adds the books you indicate, she has to remove some others. Space is finite. And can try to digest this: I am NOT talking about banning books. But if you repeat the process of the Librarian adding books that are donated or requested, and her removing others to make room, in essence, the community is choosing the collection. You seem to think this is fine. As do I. At the same time, one wouldn’t want a library to mimic a community’s mindset. Particularly, one that had little diversity of thought. So there’s a conflict between those two things. That’s what I’ve been exploring. Not the banning of books but the culling and building of a collection that would result in certain kinds of books not being available.
I would dispute that most libraries are constantly having decide which books to toss out because of overwhelming requests for other new books. More often it would be because they are worn, lost, or damaged. I’d also dispute that space is as common a problem as you think. Even if books can’t be put on a shelf, there is generally reserve space elsewhere that can be used.
No, not fine. I say it’s inevitable to a small degree, but if it drifts too much then the librarian needs to keep it balanced. This does not mean a librarian should be fired if they don’t respond to the community’s every passing whim, or ensure that the composition is satisfactory to the local majority, which is what you seemed to be suggesting.
What I’m saying is thats a LOT of librarians for a community that size, and I wouldn’t have a political appointee library director either. I’m surprised a reformer and fiscal conservative like Palin would have folded on that. There doesn’t seem to be a job here. You need a head librarian preferably with an MLS, and a volunteer committee for the museum.
(This is where I go from liberal to conservative. Don’t waste my tax dollars hiring employees that sit on their thumbs).