Libraries have always been places of refuge, of thought, of possibility. They are the quiet rooms where the world outside recedes, and where you can find the knowledge that helps you make sense of the world, or escape it.
For centuries, they’ve been the great equalizers, the free spaces where every citizen — no matter their background, their wealth, their education — can find the same access to ideas. But now, there are those who would tear all that down. These political bullies, the new Goerings, Goebbels, McCarthies, with their bloated vitriol and narrow visions see the humble library as an institution in need of destruction.
It’s a crime, really, to watch this happen. Libraries are not political tools. They are sanctuaries for free thought, and what these bullies are doing is nothing short of an assault on the very foundation of democracy. They come with their censorship, their book banning, their ideologies – replacing open dialogue with threats. They believe that controlling the information we consume will somehow make us better, safer, more obedient. But what it does instead is to make us smaller — smaller in spirit, smaller in vision, smaller in our belief that the world is vast and full of wonder.
I’ve spent my life wandering among the stacks, my hands brushing against the spines of books that challenged me, taught me, and in some cases, changed me. To destroy that, to strip people of access to that world, is not only cowardly, it’s profoundly un-American.
Libraries are the last bastion of the open mind. If we let these bullies win, we risk losing more than books. We risk losing our freedom.