It’s National Library Week, so I’ve been thinking a lot about knowledge and the idea that knowledge should be readily available – for all. An informed populace is crucial to the health of the nation and a bulwark of democracy. The ability to think, to reason, to avoid being fooled, all these notions are tied to reading and easy access to the wisdom of the ages.
And this is exactly why libraries – and their contents – are under siege these days.
HuffPost’s Jennifer Bendery recently told readers:
“Librarians are living in constant fear. They have become the targets
of Republican politicians and far-right groups like Moms for Liberty
Liberty that are hellbent on burning books about LGBTQ+ people,
people of color and racism. Some librarians are quitting their jobs
because of constant harassment; others are getting fired for
refusing to clear shelves of books that conservatives don’t like.”
If that’s not bad enough – and it is – Bendery informs us there’s another evil twist in the tale: “The GOP’s censorship campaign has shifted from book bans to legislation threatening librarians with jail time.” Idaho’s tried several times to enact such legislation; this February, West Virginia passed a bill “making librarians criminally liable if a minor comes across content that some might consider obscene.” Idaho, Iowa, Alabama, and Georgia are also considering various means of keeping books they don’t like off the shelves...and they’re not alone.
The American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom shared some frightening statistics: “The number of titles targeted for censorship at public libraries increased by 92% over the previous year, accounting for about 46% of all book challenges in 2023; school libraries saw an 11% increase over 2022 numbers.”
Given these ever-more-frequent, ever-more-strident attacks, what can a concerned reader do to stem the tide of book-banning?
PEN America, an organization whose mission “is to unite writers and their allies to celebrate creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible,” offers a number of ways to make one’s voice heard. Whether you’re a student, a parent, an author, or a librarian, PEN America provides advice, assistance, and resources to keep you informed and ready to push back.
The need to support the nation’s libraries is more urgent than ever. In Bendery’s HuffPost piece, American Library Association President Emily Drabinski draws a chilling conclusion: “What gets lost in conversations about book banning is that it’s really about eliminating the institution of the library, period. It’s not about the books. Well, it is about the books, but the books are the way in to gut one of the last public institutions that serves everyone.”
“You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture,” Ray Bradbury once said. “Just get people to stop reading them.”
Bradbury was one of the 20th century’s finest fabulists, the author of The Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked This Way Comes, and the worldwide blockbuster Fahrenheit 451. Published in 1952, the novel Fahrenheit 451 is set in a future where books are illegal and firemen don’t put out fires – they start them. Printed matter is what they burn.
Bradbury was writing in the tense, paranoid early years of the McCarthy era. But he might as well have penned those words last Thursday.
Support your local library. Speak up for the voices the hate-mongers would shut down. Before – as history’s proven again and again – they try to shut down yours.
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Students fight a book ban by giving away free banned bookswww.youtube.com
The New York Public Library has also weighed in on the matter, you can find its suggestions here.
The Magnetic Poles Might Reverse: Please Don't Panic
It's not the end of the world, but there could be some changes.
According to NASA, the Earth's magnetic poles are due for a shakeup, one that could prompt them to flip 180˚. I know, this sounds bad. First things first–and this may sound supremely obvious or very reassuring based on your level of knowledge on the subject–the flipping of the magnetic poles will not result in any of the following:
A. A chain eruption of the world's volcanoes
B. Massive earthquakes and tsunamis
C. A complete technological breakdown a la Y2K
Okay, now that we've gone through our Day After Tomorrow doomsday checklist, it's time to examine what actually might happen. In order to do this however, we have to look back in time. Based on geological studies, we know that for the past 20 million years, Earth's magnetic poles have flipped roughly every 200,000-300,000 years. It's been close to 800,000 years since the last reversal, so we're definitely overdue. That said, this flip probably won't happen overnight. In fact, there are estimates that indicate changes in the past have occurred slowly, taking a few thousand years to fully develop. This is both a good and a bad thing. It's good, because if the poles shift slowly, we'll be able to address any unforeseen consequences as they occur, rather than having a bunch of problems dropped into our lap all at once. The problem is, this slow rate of change may leave our atmosphere vulnerable.
Luckily for us, Earth is surrounded by a powerful magnetic field that protects the surface from cosmic radiation. During a geomagnetic reversal however, this field is temporarily weakened, providing less protection against solar flares. If a magnetic reversal occurs, holes in the ozone, like the one in Antarctica, could become the norm. On a positive note, these holes wouldn't be permanent, but their presence would almost certainly correspond with an increase in skin cancer diagnoses due to the abundance of ultraviolet rays that would penetrate our atmosphere. Thankfully though, the amount cosmic radiation that gets through wasn't enough to cause widespread genetic mutations in the past, and claims that magnetic pole reversal is related to mass extinction are spurious at best. While a complete thinning of the Earth's magnetic field would have some serious side effects, it's nearly impossible to predict the degree to which it would be weakened if the poles do flip, if being the operative word.
That's right, despite the fact that Earth's magnetic field's strength has been decreasing for at least the last 160 years, there's a chance that the poles won't flip at all, that the process will be aborted. There is a precedence for this, as a similar phenomenon occurred about 40,000 years ago.
Still, if our poles do flip completely, there will be some consequences. For one, campers and wilderness experts will probably have to buy new compasses. According to Nadia Drake, north will be in Antarctica and south will be somewhere in Canada. The true victims in the event of geomagnetic reversal however, will be migratory animals such as birds and sea turtles. There's a significant chance they'll have a hard time resetting their migration patterns. That said, if the fossil record is to be believed, animals have been able to sort themselves out in the past. There's no reason to believe that today's birds wouldn't eventually adjust to the new polarity.
In the end, the flipping of our magnetic poles sounds much more frightening than it actually is. The worst case scenario is one in which we all wear a little more sunscreen and sales of UV-resistant windows go way up, and there's no telling whether or not this will actually happen. There is one extremely cool benefit of a geomagnetic shift: the Auroras Borealis–a reaction between the sun's particles and our atmosphere– will be visible all over the planet. Whether they'll retain the name "Northern Lights" is a matter of speculation however.
- Scientists May Have Found The Birthplace Of Magnetic Field ... ›
- 2012: Magnetic Pole Reversal Happens All The (Geologic) Time ›
- Why You (Probably) Shouldn't Worry About Earth's Magnetic Poles ... ›
- Is the Earth's magnetic field due for a pole reversal? - Astronomy ... ›
- What Really Happens When Earth's Magnetic Field Flips? ›