Manga in NZ Library Draws Complaints

This article about a New Zealand mother trying to force her local library into new, restrictive policies concerning what comics its carries because of material she found objectionable will likely crackle through the blogging rounds today. It's a slow day (knock on wood), and censorship issues bring out the lecturer in most of us.

I never know what to say about crap like this. On the one hand, the call for the library to never buy material like this is flat-out ludicrous. I also don't get the "I checked this out with a three-year-old's library card" thing. I had a library card before I could read, so I get that. But if an adult walks up and presents a library card, I hope that the librarian is going by the fact the person is an adult rather than what kind of card they have. Same with a kid and an adult's library card. The broad strokes of the article do make it seem like the complaining person is one of those overdramatic and strident people looking to pick a fight rather than someone following a thread of inquiry to its natural conclusion. I also don't buy the thought that the ultimate responsibility for reading material belongs anywhere but with the parent. Not anymore. Maybe not ever. I remember they used to carry some of the slightly less rapey John Norman books at my library, but I sure wasn't allowed to bring that stuff home.

On the other hand, it's possible there could have been more care in shelving this material or making it automatically available. Dirk Deppey says it's Chobits, which certainly isn't New Bondage Fairies, but it's also something I've seen labeled not for children. Some parents don't want their children seeing light but sexy situations or the occasional nipple, and I wouldn't presume to dismiss that. And while God forbid I ever live in a country with a "censor's office" to lug books into, if you have such a thing and they're designating the books for a certain readership, it makes some sense that there'd be an expectation the library would have done this as well. We don't know where the books were shelved, so maybe they had.

When I was a kid you couldn't check out library books outside the kids' room unless your parent signed a permission slip that said you could. Five years later my direct market retailer refused to sell me non-code comic books until he talked to my Mom and made sure it was okay. This didn't seem like a bad thing in either case. No sweeping policies were needed. It wasn't about ceding political ground, either; it was about not being jerky. Why isn't that a solution anymore?
 
posted 3:10 am PST | Permalink
 

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