Comments on: "Banned" Books in Fake Lockers

By: zardok

zardok — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 10:49:25 +0000

Vaguely interesting side note: If you question the utility of Yahoo Answers on Yahoo Answers, you get banned. Well, experience is the best teacher.

By: Daniel Granados

Daniel Granados — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 10:43:45 +0000

I can’t believe how many librarians were too stupid to do some basic fact checking.

By: bacon

bacon — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 15:12:06 +0000

Running a library from his locker, huh? Wonder if s/he has enough room for the guitar hero, smelly homeless people and soiled couches?

By: NEJC

NEJC — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 10:24:00 +0000

Speaking of credulity…

How many librarian blogs picked this up, exactly? The comments to the Yahoo question were more than a little ridiculous, but we can hardly blame sunny librarian bloggers for those. Let’s moderate our invective before we pillory our colleagues, shall we?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 17:38:52 +0000

I agree with Marshal Auverquerque. It’s probably more of a fascination with the idea that if this were true then this would be one cool kid. At least he would be cool to librarians which is to say he would not be very cool at all. If this fictional kid wants to increase the circulation figures for his library, he should also stock some glossy “adult” magazines.

By: Solan

Solan — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 17:33:37 +0000

I can only echo what others have said — we claim that we need to teach information literacy, but when a story like this pops up, library bloggers take the bait and take it at face value without even bothering to check its veracity. How are we supposed to then go, with a straight face, and ask that our libraries be supported because we’re needed to help people navigate information and steer them toward credible sources?

By: Marshal Auverquerque

Marshal Auverquerque — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 17:17:13 +0000

Seriously, get a cultural anthropologist to look at something like this…it’s not so much that the librarians actually believe it. What’s more important is the ritual of collective self-affirmation they get from yammering back and forth to each other about how wonderful and courageous the kid is. Many of them probably know the story isn’t credible but its credibility isn’t important. It’s the social meaning that’s important. Basically, it makes them feel good about themselves regardless of it veracity. So even if they know it’s not true they don’t really care. Insecure people feeling better about themselves is more important than verifiable accuracy.

By: No. 6

No. 6 — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 16:36:51 +0000

I am continually surprised that librarians, who should be the most discerning of information consumers, fall for things like this. That should be the topic of discussion.

By: Kazoo Kid

Kazoo Kid — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 14:07:30 +0000

Oh-h-h-h. “Banned books.” When I first heard about this story I thought they were saying “Band books” and I couldn’t figure out what all the fuss was about.

By: Marshal Auverquerque

Marshal Auverquerque — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 13:47:15 +0000

If you’re going to design such a hoax, at least gear it a little better towards the gullible buffoons who will lap it up. For example, the kind of librarians who got all hot-and-happy about this would have frolicked in their buffoonery even more if the student had been a political progressive involved in various green causes, understanding for alternative lifestyles, etc. and attending not a Catholic school, but a school affiliated with an evangelical protestant demonination. I think the political polarization in that case would rise to the characiture-like level that the frolicking buffoons seems to enjoy the most.