Join the Watchdogs

Join the safe library watchdogs.  We are librarians, library directors, library school students, library patrons, law enforcement officers, politicians, and legislators who have banded together with a common goal:  Protecting children from harm in public libraries. 

WE HAVE A SECURE EMAIL: SafeLibraries@pm.me 

Safe Library Watchdogs
seek to protect children from harm.
We have come to this point as a reaction to American Civil Liberties Union [ACLU] policy that was forced on the American Library Association [ALA] by an ACLU leader who joined the ALA and spent four decades ensuring children are fully exposed to its anything-goes policies.  As a result, children are harmed on a regular basis more than they would without ALA interference in local community affairs.  And library patrons.  And library employees.  And librarians themselves.  And it happens so often that people are starting to notice.

So I have reached out to such people.  I believe if we work together we can restore good sense to the ALA.  So, in a story about how the author of the Children's Internet Protection Act [CIPA] says the ALA has misled a third of American communities into leaving their children exposed to harm, I said the following:

Now isn't that a shame?  "Indifferent" librarians?  Indifferent to children?

Not all are indifferent, and I am quietly building an organization of those who are not, but more on that much later.  Librarians willing to stand against harmful ALA policy, tactics, and indifference that endangers children may wish to contact me.  All will be kept confidential.

Well people are already contacting me.  A library student who can't stand library schools constantly pushing that keeping inappropriate material from children is censorship, as the ALA with the ACLU nexus claims.  A library patron whose kids duck down whenever they pass the library because a guy viewing child porn in the children's section of the library assaulted the patron in front of her kids and the library refused to do anything about it—nor the police as they already knew the library destroys computer logs—per ALA diktat.  A library director who said he/she refuses to allow ALA policy to invade the community.

So, folks, come join the safe library watchdogs.  Nothing will happen if no one does anything.

This page will grow from time to time as our efforts expands.  Please check in occasionally.

And check out another organization fulfilling a similar role.  We occasionally work together: Safe Schools, Safe Libraries at http://www.safelibraryproject.com/:


Contact me directly for confidentiality, or if you are not afraid to reveal your identity and situation, use the comment section below—anonymous comments are allowed and encouraged as well.


Library Watchdogs Who Have Acted to Protect Children from ALA Policy

Here are some.  Others fill my SafeLibraries blog, but you get the picture.  A lot of people are speaking out against ALA policy.  Why not you?  Join us.

NOTICE:  LISTED BELOW ARE PEOPLE TAKING ACTION AGAINST ALA POLICY VIS-A-VIS CHILDREN.  THEY HAVE NO AFFILIATION WITH SAFELIBRARIES OR ANY LIBRARIES WATCHDOGS UNLESS SPECIFICALLY STATED IN THE POSTS.

Librarians:


Library Directors:


Library Patrons:


Library Students / College Students:


Library Security Guards:


School Parents:


School Superintendents:


Political Leaders / Activists:
Volunteers are needed to help visit public libraries and conduct a simple survey to assess whether mandated filters are in place on the public computers.


Media Editorials/Opinions:


Authors / Writers:


Why the Name "Library Watchdogs"?

I have chosen that name because that is what one media source called me, and I liked it, and it fits what we do:
  • "Library Seeks Porn Parity," by Sarah Portlock, The Brooklyn Paper, 17 May 2008:
    Case in point, after The Brooklyn Paper reported last week that a teenager was raped in the bathroom at the Central branch on Grand Army Plaza, library watchdog Dan Kleinman asked whether the assailants were watching pornography before the attack.

    He said his group, SafeLibraries.org, knows of at least two cases when porn consumption at libraries led to sexual attacks.

Miscellaneous

Related to child sexualization and culture wars generally, here is state representative in the Indiana General Assembly Bob Morris who refuses to back down, and his example of not bowing down to political forces to sexualize children is admirable.  Some of the malefactors are the same ones affecting the ALA:
Speaking of which, the ALA just got its censorship, Banned Books Week propaganda broadcast by the U.S. Department of State, and without a lick of balance.  Who cares that the USA has seen no book ban in half a century, right?

5 comments:

  1. CHWed Apr 18, 07:30:00 PM 2012

    How do you use donations? I just found you. Trying to get Internet porn out of my library w/letter to editor of local paper. Requested paper do investigative article on subject, which they are working on. So excited about new federal ruling. It makes me sick how many people at harmed by ALA's idiotic stance.

    ReplyDelete
  2. SafeLibraries®Thu Apr 19, 01:35:00 AM 2012

    CH, thank you for commenting.

    I will be happy to speak with you about your efforts in your community. The sooner the better.

    You see, the ALA has been misleading communities for over four decades on these types of issues. It is a well-honed message effectively pushed into local communities via local librarians or trustees. Part of the success of the message relies on people making complaints having absolutely no experience and speaking out emotionally. Make one false step and it is immediately used to make you look like a fool so that no one will listen to you.

    So they have all this experience, newbies come along and get shot down quickly, and this makes them feel good.

    Contrast this with newbies in small claims courts. Many newbies will handle cases by themselves. They are called pro se litigants. The pro se litigants file court papers that may be laughable in comparison to the well-honed messages of the lawyers on the other side. Fortunately, there's a judge involved. That judge seeks fairness, not form, truth, not politics. That judge will not let the pro se litigant who makes one false step into a fool. Instead, a judge will bend over backwards to help the pro se litigant properly form his complaint so that justice is done.

    Not so in libraries. Make a mistake and it could cause you years and years of ridicule, like happens in a number of cases, notably West Bend, WI. Heck the librarian there is still giving talks for the ALA, etc., about the incident that occurred years ago. The library will not act as impartial judge to help you form your complaint properly. Instead, it will immediately or almost immediately mock you, if it follows the ALA model. For example, the ALA used the 2009 Banned Books Week to promote a video that labelled 100% of book challengers as "censors." So that's the lesson to the troops: attack at all times and don't let up. If given the opportunity, ridicule. Go negative. Attack the person. Stop the censor. Ignore the issues.

    And the media is often no help as the ALA provides advice on how to get media to report the library message, not the truth. Hence, for example, despite the last book having been banned in the USA about half a century ago, media headlines frequently use the words "banned" or "censored" even if that is not the truth. That's just the tip of the iceberg.

    All that was said to encourage you to contact me BEFORE taking action. I will advise you how to form your complaint or letter to the editor in a manner that will reduce the hooks they use to ridicule you. I will increase your chances of being successful in your efforts. I have been doing this for over a decade. I see the same pattern again and again and again. I'll help you avoid the mines they intentionally lay, sometimes even right in the material reconsideration forms themselves. Could you imagine if a court of law treated pro se litigants the way ALA-acolyte libraries treat complaining patrons?

    Continuing in next comment ….

    ReplyDelete
  3. SafeLibraries®Thu Apr 19, 01:39:00 AM 2012

    …. Continued from previous comment:

    You asked about how I use donations. First you should know I do not get many as I don't really push that button. But what I do get is used for a number of things, most significantly calling and or visiting various people having problems with libraries. Traveling to investigate libraries or give library safety talks. Buying web services and the means to protect myself from those who choose to harm me and my family so as to shut me up--that's right, some "free speech" people practice the opposite of what they preach. To them, the means justifies the ends. Perhaps if I get enough donations I could pay for the high fees and costs of filing for a 501[c][3] tax exempt organization, but I cannot afford to register as such at this time.

    If you wish to donate, there are buttons on my blog to do so. Feel free to wait until I have helped you. I have never yet asked for donations, to my recollection, other than the buttons on my blog, and I will likely not ask you. No one yet has donated anything who did not first speak with me, so the buttons are really for their convenience of paying at the safe, secure PayPal web site.

    You see, I am happy to help for free. My payment is the children/librarians/patrons I potentially help by providing others with the information needed to sail through the library's mined challenge process. My payment is the hugs I get from frustrated parents having schools that push pervasively vulgar material on their children and even bully children to the point of tears. My payment is the connections I make with legislators working on laws to protect children. That is worth far more than money. I cannot possibly be everywhere, but if I can help people like you to work within your own community, then I will have been more than paid.

    On the other side could be local people paid quietly by the ALA for advocating the ALA point of view. That West Bend case, for example, involved a quiet $1000 grant from the ALA to the leading opponent of using the law to protect library patrons and employees. It was announced nowhere publicly until it was discovered after the filing of a Freedom of Information Act request. The ALA grant recipient bragged about it to the library director, if I recall, and that email was revealed in the FOIA request, and that's how we first learned of it.

    So your opposition is well entrenched, won't give an inch, will use ad hominem argument, and is willing to quietly buy the result they want. On the other hand, so far as I know, there is only myself and Safe Schools, Safe Libraries Project who will help you and people like you.

    I hope to hear from you and anyone else needing assistance.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousWed May 09, 12:27:00 AM 2012

    I came across your blog several weeks ago. Earlier in the school year my 6th grader told me about the pornography kids were accessing on the internet. At that point I honestly had no idea that they were allowed on non-school sites. Just finding out that he could go anywhere was enough for me to raise questions. After talking to the teacher and principal and actually getting on to a school " net-book" with my son with me, and showing them the content, nothing happened. They tossed me to the Technology Department who said they would " work on it."
    From there I had the inclination to review a library book my other older son brought home from school. It had a PG13 label on it, which I thought was odd. I had never seen that before. So I looked up a review on the book and was stunned.
    I would love to get in touch with you . I have done hours and hours of research, now I need a gameplan. I don't want to say much here, please email me though, if possible. Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousSun May 05, 05:14:00 AM 2013

    I wouldn't give Rory Litwin and his ultra-leftist Library Juice any praise, especially based on one article. Litwin heads the "progressive" SRRT, the so-called Social Responsibilities Round Table of the ALA. It is this group that has been pushing pornography in libraries and which is fiercely against Internet filters. The thousands of SRRT members vote as a block and have packed the ALA Council with their own members.

    ReplyDelete

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