in library school, you learn about intellectual freedom and about how books on witches may be exactly what your community is looking for. as their librarian, you have the responsibility of providing the best of those books despite what your own opinion may be. on the very grand scale, librarians control information by what they make available for people to read. it all sounds marvelous on paper and even in practice a little bit. i buy books on ghosts for my third graders and diet books for the older patrons (both of which are usually equally fantastical).

today, however, my own integrity was severely tested. the books in my library come from two sources - some of them i buy and others are bought for my by the central distribution system. that system is responsible for sending me a highly political piece of propaganda disguised as a children's book and written by the daughter of a current presidential candidate. it begins: "there are a few things you should know about my dad and one of them is that he would make a great president."

i may have actually gagged.

BUT, true to my profession, the book now sits on my new book shelf (i didn't even bury it back in the biographies where no one would have found it!), albeit on a lower shelf (closer to the kids' eye levels! must rethink that...).

i fall back on my freedom of information classes.
i think about my discernment classes from calvin.

someone should have warned me that this whole discernment/christian librarian thing was going to be hard.

stupid ethics.