So news that the American Library Association will announce its 2010 Youth Media Awards in just a couple of weeks should be good news for those who want to enrich their kids' cultural and intellectual lives, right? Just read what the ALA Web site has to say about the awards:
Recognized worldwide for the high quality they represent, the ALA Youth Media Awards guide parents, educators, librarians and others in selecting the best materials for youth. Selected by committees composed of librarians and other literature and media experts, the awards encourage original and creative work in the field of children's and young adult literature and media.
But in the case of the Youth Media Awards, the ALA's "librarians and other literature and media experts" have a very different conception of the "best materials for youth" than most parents. The ALA has a public social and political agenda that endorses same-sex marriage, and who's agenda is glaringly reflected in the books it chooses to award and those it chooses to ignore, or even - yes - ban.
If past awards are any indication, parents can look forward to the ALA guiding them to dozens of books with themes about "coming out," pedophilia, trans-gender issues, and sodomy laws.
The ALA does not exist simply to provide good, wholesome literature to children. It's quite the opposite, in fact. The ALA is a liberal organization that relentlessly pursues a homosexual agenda, and it relies heavily on "authentic literature" to drive that agenda.
‘Authenticity' According to ALA
"Authentic literature" is the term that has been adopted by the ALA to describe books with "literary merit." It sounds harmless enough - just saying "authentic literature" evokes images of musty catalog cards and spinster librarians. In reality, however, it's a manipulative term abused by the liberal ALA to promote books like "Skim," written by Mariko Tamaki and illustrated by her cousin Jillian Tamaki.
"Skim" is a "graphic novel" (aka a comic book) about a depressed, gothic, homosexual, Wicca-worshipping high school girl and, according to the ALA, that's good literature - it's "authentic literature."
The protagonist of the graphic novel, Kim Cameron - nicknamed "Skim" because she's not slim - participates in séances, channels the spirits, swears judiciously, discusses porn and handjobs, and skips class to smoke. The major plot of the story revolves around Skim's relationship with her flaky drama teacher, Ms. Archer. When Ms. Archer catches Skim skipping class and smoking a cigarette, she sits down for a drag herself, which eventually leads to a romantic relationship depicted in a double-page tableau of the two kissing in the woods.
Published in 2008, the ALA has already given "Skim" numerous awards, including a spot on the "2009 Top Ten Best Books for Young Adults" and the "2009 Top Ten Great Graphic Novels for Teens."
The ALA claims that "authentic literature" like "Skim" more accurately portrays the gritty, real American life, and therefore, has more literary merit. It's a manipulative tactic that has effectively stocked library shelves across the nation with pro-homosexual books that inevitably fall into children's hands.
Three years ago Massachusetts parent Robin Wirthlin's second-grade son came home from school and told his mother about a book called "King & King" that his teacher had read to the class.
"On the tallest mountain above the town, lived a queen," the book began. "She decides her son should marry and invites princesses from around the world, but one by one the prince rejects them all until he notices the princess who's come with her brother."
It's not the princess he's attracted to, though. It's the princess' brother. The book "resolves" the conflict by marrying the prince and the princess' brother, a scene depicted on the last page with the two kissing each other.
Wirthlin, disturbed by her son's story, confronted the teacher about reading such a controversial book at an age when boys think that girls have cooties.
"It's introducing the concept that if I don't like other girls, then maybe that means that I'm gay," Wirthlin later said in an interview with NPR's Tovia Smith.
The second-grade teacher defended her actions by saying that a student had found the book at the school library and had simply asked her to read it to the class. And the library had it on the shelf because it represented "authentic literature."
But conservatives like Steve Baldwin, a former California legislator and chairman of the Assembly Education Committee, haven't been fooled by the ALA's word games. In his article "Parents Protest American Library Association's ‘Censorship'," Baldwin wrote that "authentic literature" simply glorifies "druggies, sex addicts, pedophiles, gang members and others on the fringes of society."
"The authentic literature books," Baldwin continued, "are rife with profanity and are dominated by themes of death, crime, drug addiction, rapes, gang beatings, weird sex, homosexual encounters, and so on. Shockingly, many of them violate state obscenity laws and even school district age appropriate regulations."
Baldwin gave examples of "authentic literature" that the ALA has awarded in the past, such as "At Swim, Two Boys" and "Lawnboy" - both of which are replete with themes of pedophilia. And the ALA continues to promote such books today.
The GayLA
The ALA, for whatever reason, has taken up the cause of normalizing homosexuality and advancing the gay agenda.
Just this year alone, the ALA awarded more than forty pro-homosexual books; at least seven of those books received two or even three ALA awards.
The book "After Tupac & D Foster," for example, which had a detailed account of homophobes beating a helpless gay boy, was not only listed on the ALA's Rainbow List and its "Best Books for Young Adults" but it was also an ALA Newbery Honor winner.
The Rainbow List was created by the ALA in 2007 to "provide young people with books that ... relate to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer/questioning experience." The award promotes homosexual books that target children as young as preschool. This year its list of honorees included "Uncle Bobby's Wedding" - a book for preschoolers about two male guinea pigs marrying each other - and another preschool book called "10,000 Dresses," a story about a young boy that dreams of wearing "magical dresses: dresses made of crystals and rainbows, dresses made of flowers, dresses made of windows."
There's also another specific award that focuses on homosexuality called the Stonewall Book Award. Some of the non-fiction, teen-targeted books it awarded this year include "Assisted Loving: True Tales of Double Dating with my Dad," and "Dishonorable Passions: Sodomy Laws in America, 1861-2003," a book that examines the "destructive history" of laws banning "nonreproductive sexual activity" based on "Christian interpretations of a few biblical passages."
With both the Rainbow and the Stonewall Awards specifically geared towards the homosexual agenda, why were numerous homosexual books still given additional, perhaps more mainstream awards, like the Newbery? The simple argument, of course, would be that its good literature and it deserves to be awarded. But that argument doesn't hold when compared to books that won awards in other specialized ALA categories.
Neither of the teen-oriented Batchelder award winners - the ALA award that recognizes books published in foreign countries - were even listed on "Best Books for Young Adults"; and out of the four teen books that won the Coretta Scott King Award - the ALA award that honors the African American culture - only one was chosen for the list.
Are these books just not as good as the gay-themed books? That would be difficult to argue. The more likely scenario is that the ALA awarded these homosexual books numerous times in order to increase their likelihood of landing on library shelves. Just like movies with raving reviews (and Oscars) are more likely to be watched, books that have numerous, well-known awards are more likely to be stocked.
And it's these "award-winning books" that are ousting truly inspiring books from library shelves across the nation. In his article, Baldwin warned his readers that this trend will only get worse with time.
"Increasingly, this [authentic] literature is replacing the traditional literature classics, which, in general, promoted mainstream American values or at least didn't undermine them," he wrote. "The books that used to inspire; which celebrated American values; that chronicled the exploits of trailblazers, astronauts, soldiers, and other heroes are fast disappearing. And their replacements are books like: ‘A Woman in Heat Wiping Herself,' ‘Outside the Operating Room of a Sex-Change Doctor,' and the ‘Rainbow Boys,' a story of three homosexual boys and the various routes they took in ‘coming out.'"
And if anyone causes a stir about books like these appearing on shelves in public and school libraries, the ALA will come charging out, acting like the stalwart defender of freedom in the face of tyranny.
Phyllis Schlafly, founder and president of the conservative interest group Eagle Forum, warned her readers that those who file a complaint against a library book will be accused by the ALA of being "zealots and bigots who live in fear of discourse" as well as "screamers and book banners and book burners." The purpose of this nasty name calling, Schlafy said, is to "intimidate parents from ever complaining about books that are given to their own children."
"These people accused of being ‘book banners'," she concluded, "are just ordinary parents who want to limit their own children's exposure to material they consider harmful or obscene."
Whenever these so-called "book burners" confront the ALA about inappropriate or obscene literature, the organization will inevitably begin touting its "Intellectual Freedom Principles," which read as follows:
1) Books and other library resources should be provided for the interest, information, and enlightenment of all people of the community the library serves. Materials should not be excluded because of the origin, background, or views of those contributing to their creation.
2) Libraries should provide materials and information presenting all points of view on current and historical issues. Materials should not be proscribed or removed because of partisan or doctrinal disapproval.
But, as many conservatives have discovered, the ALA only applies those principles when it's convenient.
The ALA's Hypocrisy
Every year the ALA likes to remind Americans about its "Intellectual Principles" by sponsoring a "Banned Books Week." The event supposedly "celebrates the freedom to read." But others, like the well-known economist and author Thomas Sowell, call it what it is: "National Hogwash Week."
"To call a book ‘banned' because someone decided that it was unsuitable for their particular students or clientele would be to make at least 99 percent of all books ‘banned'," Sowell wrote in his 1994 article "Hogwash is Happening."
"No one calls it censorship," he continued, "when the old McGruffey's Readers are no longer purchased by the public schools ... No one calls it censorship if the collected works of Rush Limbaugh are not put into libraries and schools in every town, hamlet and middlesex village. It is only when the books approved by the elite intelligentsia are objected to by others that it is called censorship. Apparently we are not to talk back to our betters."
Even a former ALA councilor admitted that the majority of these "banned books" simply have been "challenged by parents for being age-inappropriate for children."
Not exactly the pitchfork and torches image that's usually associated with "Banned Books Week."
Ironically, despite the ALA's greatest efforts to appear as the defender of books and free thought, during last year's "Banned Books Week," librarians were the ones banning books.
"During a week that librarians nationwide are highlighting banned books, conservative Christian students and parents showcased their own collection outside a Fairfax County high school yesterday - a collection they say was banned by the librarians themselves," reported the Washington Post on Oct. 3, 2008.
More than a dozen high school libraries rejected over 100 books that featured conservative perspectives on homosexuality, which were offered by the Colorado-based Focus on the Family. The books were meant to balance the overabundance of pro-gay literature on library shelves today. Some of the titles included "Marriage on Trial: The Case Against Same-sex Marriage" and "My Genes Made Me Do It! A Scientific Look at Sexual Orientation" - which argues that choice, not just biology, determines your sexuality.
The Fairfax County librarians claimed that the books failed to meet "school system standards," which include two positive reviews from "professionally recognized journals." But these claims have been met with some skepticism - even from other librarians.
The "Annoyed Librarian," for example, a blogger for LibraryJournal.com, pointed out the circular argument of demanding two positive reviews from "professionally recognized journals." She wrote this short, satirical scenario:
"Hey," say the conservative Christians, "we found fifteen journals that reviewed Marriage on Trial!"
"I'm sorry," say the librarians, "we don't professionally recognize those journals."
Fox News' Diane Macedo, who also wrote about the the Virginia librarians banning the "ex-gay" books, doubted the two review standard entirely. As proof, she highlighted some books that had apparently met the rigorous standards of Fairfax County libraries that the conservative, Christian books had not.
"Baby Be-bop," for example, the "coming-out story of a gay teen, which includes descriptions of his sexual encounters in bathroom stalls with men he never talks to," found a spot on the bookshelves." So did "Love & Sex: Ten Stories of Truth," which "describes a gay teen's relationship with his tutor with excerpts like: ‘Matt had one leg locked between mine, so that his dick was smashed between his stomach and my thigh. And as his hand jerked up and down on me his hips humped with the same rhythm.'"
But other books, such as "You Don't Have to Be Gay," "which describes author Jeff Konrad's struggle to overcome his unwanted same-sex attractions," doesn't meet their high standards.
The Washington Post, which had also been following the story, asked Susan Thornily, the coordinator of library information services for Fairfax schools, what the conservative books were lacking. Thornily replied that the books, "were heavy on scripture but light on research." Ironically, her reason directly conflicts with the ALA's Library "Bill of Rights," which states that books cannot be rejected on grounds of "doctrinal disapproval."
Thornily also claimed that the books would make gay students "feel inferior." Of course, as the "Annoyed Librarian" gamely pointed out on her blog, "Conservative Christians are a minority group, and no one cares about offending them."
"How are we supposed to take seriously," she wrote, "the caveat that the books would make gay students ‘feel inferior'? And how is that any different than African American students feeling inferior by having Huckleberry Finn on the shelves? Or conservative Christians feeling ‘inferior' because every book on homosexuality in their library says exactly the same thing, that every opinion they have is wrong and they are bad people for being so intolerant? Whatever happened to that old librarian standby that just because a book offends a portion of the population doesn't mean it shouldn't be in the collection? They sure like to trot that warhorse out when ‘conservative Christians' complain about Heather Has Two Very Excited Daddies."
That's exactly the point of organizations like Focus on the Family and its affiliates, such as the Illinois Family Institute and the Virginia-based Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX), but it's a message that the ALA refuses to even hear. The ALA has an agenda of its own. Just last year the ALA Council unanimously passed a resolution at their annual meeting that states that the ALA "supports the right of every person to marry, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender couples, wherever they reside."
Regina Griggs, the executive director of PFOX said in an interview with Fox News, "It's almost an attack on us as an organization merely because we want to allow people to have all the information on both sides. We aren't out there forcing people to do anything ... they have a right to know all of the facts to determine for themselves."
Their fight for equal representation, however, will no doubt be a long, uphill battle. As Prof. David Durant wrote in his article "The Chronicle of Higher Education," "In terms of political composition, the library profession makes your typical Ivy League faculty look like the Heritage Foundation."
