#tldr libraries are political truth is political gatekeeping is necessary and important

[librarycards]

Of everyone I follow you seem like the person most likely to have something interesting to say about something I've been considering lately: is the way libraries currently handle pseudoscience and other harmful content acceptable? I don't mean stuff like "should Lolita be banned from public libraries", I don't think that's useful. But I recently discovered my local library system has a dozen books on "curing autism" with disproven diets and at least 3 or 4 on "climate change is fake the liberals are lying to you". I assume these books are allowed to be there bc we believe people should be allowed to read whatever they want, even if it is wrong or harmful. But ngl, finding out my library has booklets on the COVID vaccine being dangerous on top of the other quack shit, it feels like something has gone very wrong. Idk, what do you think?

I think about this -- and larger issues of censorship -- often, both in terms of the lolita stuff and in terms of the naming of pseudoscience, though I do think it's important to remember that what counts as "pseudoscience" is temporally, culturally, and socially specific -- that isn't to say "climate change is fake" or "vaccines cause autism" are, like, valid claims (they're not) but that during different eras, in different areas, and among different groups, libraries and other orgs will have different criteria for evidence and truth. evidence and truth themselves are such heavily loaded concepts that we find these questions to be always-already political.

all that said, what i've learned in my brief foray into studying library curation/info studies is this: libraries, much like journalists, ought to provide information responsibly, in ways beneficial to the public good. they do *not* have a responsibility to simply info-vomit at you and expect you to do the rest. they don't keep books forever –– otherwise, i could go looking for info on biology and find books that didn't mention DNA. if places published every crackpot theory any person ever raised, it would be physically impossible to locate and synthesize info. there would just be too much. there's a reason i'm not the one being quizzed on what to do about climate change, or how in the shit we are –– i have a layperson's background in climate science. that isn't to say my perspective on climate science is useless, or that anything i wrote about climate change is inherently out of place in a library or is harmful, but instead that a library can and should evaluate my claims in accordance with my background, my personal and social interests, and the other writings they make available.

similarly, the new york times had to reckon with this wrt their both-sidesism, presenting actual na z/is as well as antifascists as if these were equivalents. i think the harm we see there can be extended to the presentation of antivax and pro-vaccine rhetorics and climate change denial/ climate change aware rhetorics: while they're both "perspectives" people hold, it is under no circumstances in the interest of the public good for a library to stock information that, in effect, supports the systemic and eugenic murder of large groups of people. a library exists not simply to be a shelf for every book someone decides to put out there. they exist to curate, even to gatekeep, and a good curator will evaluate not only the contents but the impacts and citational chains a given work is imbricated in. they'll ask if it's relevant, if it's beneficial, if it contributes significantly and in good faith to xyz debates, etc. –– and, often, including in the case of pseudoscientific, ableist, racist, etc. texts –– if it colludes with violent systems of power.