Intellectual Freedom News 10/29/2021
Highlights
The Freedom to Read is a Right and Must be Protected | Texas Library Association
Censorship
- Texas House committee to investigate school districts’ books on race and sexuality | The Texas Tribune
- Library board votes to keep challenged book in teen section | Gillette News Record
- Rod Miller — The Gillette Library: Bonfire of the Vanities, Redux | Cowboy State Daily
- No charges for Wyoming librarians over sex ed, LGBTQ books | AP News
- ‘A very slippery slope that we need to be careful of’: Approval of library grant postponed after Kenai council requests to preview book purchases | Peninsula Clarion
- Kenai Peninsula residents organize fundraiser for library amid accusations of censorship | Anchorage Daily News
- GOP chairman: Mom ‘shocked by books Forsyth school provides. Raymond again suggests calling cops over titles parents find offensive. | Winston-Salem Journal
- Letter: Stop censorship at Bloomington [IL] library | Pantagraph
- Right-wing parents hope to turn schools into conservative ‘citadels’ | American Independent
- Drag Queen Story Time opponent elected president of Lafayette library board | Acadiana Advocate
- Board, parents debate censorship of books in Hamilton County Schools libraries | News Channel 9 ABC
- Opinion: A social media uproar, a book challenge in Roseburg | Oregon Live
- ‘Robbed of their innocence.’ KY school district tosses controversial curriculum. | Lexington Herald Leader
- Inappropriate book pulled from New Kent Middle School library circulation | New Kent Charles City Chronicle
- Selection process of library books elaborated at New Kent School Board work session | New Kent Charles City Chronicle
- Mother calls for action over controversial LGBTQ book | ABC 6
- ‘Trash’ book should not be on library shelves, says Byron Twp trustee | WOOD TV
- Award-winning children’s author speaks to Katy ISD students after critical race theory controversy | KRPC 2 Houston
- Three K-12 teachers weigh in on the consequences of Critical Race Theory bans | Ms. Magazine
- Library releases list of transferred children’s books | KAIT8 (Jonesboro, AR)
- 5 library books in Virginia Beach schools under review | 13NewsNow
- What should the library do with an objectionable book? | Evanston Review
- Glenn Youngkin wants to ban Toni Morrison’s Beloved | The New Republic
- Banning Toni Morrison’s books doesn’t protect kids. It just sanitizes racism. | The Washington Post
- In the Va. governor’s race, ‘Beloved’ is reduced to its most explicit parts. That’s obscene. | The Washington Post
- North Penn parents bash board over books in school libraries | Reporter
- There is a consistency to the debate over book censorship: Distress about change | The Washington Post
- Georgetown Twp. superintendent told to review library books ‘deemed inappropriate for youth’ | WOOD TV
- Books temporarily removed from Waukee Northwest High School after complaint at school board meeting | We Are Iowa
- A school mural was supposed to celebrate black lives. Instead, it was destroyed. | The New York Times
Privacy & Cybersecurity
- Internet Service Providers Collect, Sell Horrifying Amount of Sensitive Data, Government Study Concludes | Vice
- Here’s the FBI’s Internal Guide for Getting Data from AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon | Vice
- How Can Government Protect Constituents’ Digital Privacy? | Government Technology
- 20 years later, it’s time to move on from mass surveillance | The Hill
More privacy news is available at the Voices for Privacy blog.
First Amendment, Free Speech, & Civil Liberties
- It’s not so easy to tell when unhinged ideas deserve First Amendment protection | Sun Journal
- Federal judge tells parties in Ten Commandments lawsuit to get a move on | Arkansas Online
- Charlottesville civil trial over deadly 2017 ‘Unite the Right’ rally set to begin | ABC News
- State Anti-Protest Laws and Their Constitutional Implications | Lawfare
- We need to do a better job teaching citizens about the First Amendment | USA Today
- ACLU of South Dakota: Dept. of Education revisions to Social Studies Standards, creation of second working group likely violate federal and constitutional law | DRGNews
- First Amendment vs. public duty: Police social posts renew concerns about bias, solutions | Providence Journal
- The Second Amendment has become a threat to the First: Firearms are having a documented chilling effect on free speech | The Atlantic
- Slavery-era Georgia law in focus in trial over Ahmaud Arbery’s killing | Reuters
Copyright
Access
- FCC proposes rule change to help tribal libraries with broadband | Marketplace
- Action needed now to preserve an essential lifeline during the pandemic | Benton Institute for Broadband & Society
Net Neutrality & Broadband Access
- Mass. Bill Would Bring Regulation Back to Broadband Industry | Government Technology
- An FTC report on big telecom puts Biden’s inaction on net neutrality in the spotlight | Daily Dot
- Biden’s FCC Picks Are a Prelude to Democratic Net Neutrality Push | Bloomberg Law
Academic Freedom & Campus Speech
- Princeton director blasts MIT for ‘chilling’ decision to cancel professor’s lecture, thousands log on to hear prof’s science research | Sentinel and Enterprise
- UM professor steps down following controversial blog post | KPAX
- Texas professor allegedly fired after tweet about Mike Pence’s ‘little demon mouth’ files First Amendment suit against college | Law & Crime
Social Media
- Wisconsin bill would prohibit social media ‘censorship’ | Superior Telegram
- Not stopping ‘Stop the Steal:’ Facebook Papers paint damning picture of company’s role in insurrection | The Citizen
- ‘Carol’s Journey’: What Facebook knew about how it radicalized users | NBC News
- Five points for anger, one for a ‘like’: How Facebook’s formula fostered rage and misinformation | The Washington Post
- Bystander intervention on social media: Examining cyberbullying and reactions to systemic racism | Brookings
Information Literacy & Disinformation
- Civic boosters in Montana hoped for federal money to promote tourism. A disinformation campaign got in the way. | The Baltimore Sun
- Ex-Facebook employee says company has known about disinformation problem for years | NPR
- Oil executives to face Congress on climate disinformation | The New York Times
- Exclusive: Billionaires back new media firm to combat disinformation | Axios
International News
- Chinese censorship is going global | Foreign Policy
- De Lima seeks probe into removal of anti-gov’t books, materials from state universities | Manila Bulletin
- Russia is Censoring the Internet, With Coercion and Black Boxes | The New York Times
- Taming the tech giants is one thing. Giving free rein to censors quite another | The Guardian
- A-level textbook withdrawn over ‘shocking’ Native American question | BBC News
- FB allows Vietnam to censor anti-govt. posts | NHK World-Japan
- Hong Kong passes film censorship law to ‘safeguard national security’ | CNN
- A history of judges wanting to censor LGBTQ+ books | Al Dia News
Around the Web
- School board meetings have gotten heated; this one in California is on a new level | NPR
- The GOP’s Grievance Industrial Complex Invades the Classroom | The Nation
- What’s motivating someone to run for school board? Beware of one-issue candidates | Akron Beacon Journal
- Anti-“CRT” petition in Stafford County [VA] reminds us: “Because fanaticism and ignorance is forever busy, and needs feeding…” | Blue Virginia
- Opinion: Republicans want to politicize your kids’ schooling, sanitizing America’s past | Berkshire Eagle
- Three Trials in America: Conversations playing out in courtrooms in Kenosha, Charlottesville, and Georgia are revealing | Slate
- Q&A with the women who resurrected a fiery feminist’s book banned for ‘obscenity’ after its publication in 1925 | Chicago Tribune
- Energizing Conservative Voters, One School Board Election at a Time | The New York Times
- The Cost of Censorship | The Boston Globe
- A photographer and artist walk into a fake news factory | Coda
- The forgotten history of Republican book banning | The Week
- Mom who wanted to ban ‘Beloved’ featured in new Glenn Youngkin ad | Huff Post
ALA News
- Performer and comedian Molly Shannon, Young Adult author Kelly Yang, join LibLearnX speaker lineup
- ALA President Patty Wong to host ALA Connect Live on equity, diversity, and inclusion
- At the heart of their schools, school librarians display the power to change communities at 2021 AASL National Conference
- ALA welcomes long-awaited nominees and library supporters Rosenworcel (FCC Chair), Sohn (FCC Commissioner) and Davidson (NTIA Administrator)
- ACRL, PLA partner launch Benchmark, a new digital data tool for libraries
- ALA seeks applicants for national Policy Corps
Awards & Grant
eLearning
Publishing
- Classifying and fixing dirty data
- Journey through school librarianship using AASL’s Shared Foundation of Explore
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