To ban, or not to ban

On Monday, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) signed a first-of-its-kind bill that will cut off state funding for libraries attempting to ban books due to “partisan or doctrinal” reasons.

📖 Technically speaking… The Democrat-backed bill, which takes effect in 2024, wouldn’t require every book to remain in every public library. Instead, it would give each local librarian sole discretion to decide which books should be banned, and which should stay in circulation.

🚫📚 Big picture: Illinois’ new law comes as states across the US have seen a sharp uptick in book ban efforts. The American Library Association identified 1,269 such attempts last year – the highest mark since it began tracking that data in 2001, and nearly twice as many compared to 2021 (the previous all-time high).

ALA officials say a majority of the book ban efforts focused on stories about people of color and LGBTQ+ individuals, as well as depictions of race, racism, and sexuality. In addition, a handful of attempts were aimed at keeping potentially age-inappropriate religious texts away from younger children.

A few examples:

• Residents of a rural western Michigan town voted in November to defund a local library over a dispute related to LGBTQ+ content.
• In Texas and Tennessee, laws banning critical race theory in public schools have been used to remove books that discuss racism from school districts inacross both states.
• A Utah school district has banned the Bible from its elementary and middle schools for containing too much “vulgarity or violence” – and is also considering doing so for the Book of Mormon.

📊 Flash poll: In your opinion, is there ever a time when a book or novel should be banned from being made available in a public library or public school classroom?

Yes

No

Unsure/other