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Censorship is not merely the desire to not see information. Censorship requires power and moderation authority. Merely blocking someone or a subject from your s

Censorship is not merely the desire to not see information. Censorship requires power and moderation authority. Merely blocking someone or a subject from your social media feed does not constitute censorship. When a public authority defunds a library to the extent of facing shutdown because it's carrying unpopular content, that's censorship, plain and simple. There's no getting around that. Censorship doesn't need to be spelt out to be censorship.

Dalewyn 4y ago
I think we need to clarify what's really at play here. The institution in question is a public library, funded by public money (taxes). Because the library operates at the cost of the taxpayers, the library has an implicit obligation to act in a manner satisfactory to the majority of the taxpayers. Ergo, the library operates at the pleasure of the public. Now, you might ask why the taxpayers have such powers over the library? That is because the taxpayers have a right to demand and have their tax dollars be spent in a way that is satisfactory to them. How do the taxpayers exercise their will, you might ask? By voting, as any upstanding citizen would do in a democracy, on measures that would allocate tax dollars to the library. And vote they did: 62% nays to 37% yays. In summary, this is not censorship; not the least because the audience for the library in question are the voters who voted against its continued funding. This is simply the public exercising their right to decide how their taxes that they paid are used.
- danaris 4y ago
  No, the library has an obligation to act in the interest of the public. Not for the pleasure of the public. Your logic clearly invites the tyranny of the majority.
  - Dalewyn 4y ago
    No, the library cannot demand how other people spend their money. If it's funded by public money, it operates at the pleasure of the public.
- mcphage 4y ago
  This is amazing, instead of censorship being something the state does, you've talked yourself around to a position where the state can't possibly do censorship.
  - Dalewyn 4y ago
    Censorship is when a third-party to communications comes in and dictates what communiques may be exchanged by the other parties. Such as a government coming in and regulating speech, or a communication medium coming in and regulating what can be exchanged upon its infrastructure. This chain of events isn't censorship because the people defunding the library are quite literally the people the library serves. There is no third-party. The very people the library serves decided, democratically in a free and fair election, the library was not worth continued funding. This is akin to someone blocking another person on a communication medium because they don't like them, which is within their rights. I'm just as against censorship as any other free speech advocate you can find, but calling this an infringement of free speech is disingenuous at best. The library is still free to collect and exhibit whatever books it wants; it just can't bill the people it serves, the taxpayers, for those books anymore.
- salawat 4y ago
  Nope. You want a Library, you get a Library. A Library is a cache of information and knowledge, and it is guaranteed at least some is going to be disagreeable to you. That's a certainty. Knowledge hurts, or is otherwise unpleasant and character challenging at times. That's the point! The same reason the Public University is viewed as being a bastion for the free exercise and pursuit of controversial ideas, so too is the Public Library. I will never understand the mentality that makes people think Libraries are there to please you, or serve as ideological echo chambers. It's like you've never spoken with a Librarian before.
  - Dalewyn 4y ago
    I think you're misunderstanding where I stand. I don't disagree with the purpose of a library, which is to collect and exhibit information as curated by librarians for the purposes of enriching the public; whether the public likes it or not. The problem here is, while libraries have a right to collect and exhibit whatever they please, in this case the library is doing so using tax dollars. This means that the taxpayers, the public, has an authoritative say on how the library operates with that money. So the taxpayers, being dissatisfied with the way their tax dollars were being used, rightfully voted to cut off further funding. The library is free to exercise its right to free expression, but it got told to do so on its own dime. Essentially, anything that operates off of Other Peoples' Money(tm) operates at the pleasure of those people. Certain rights can and should be exercised by such institutions, but the Other Peoples can also choose to then redirect their money elsewhere because it's their money and they rightfully get to choose how it's spent.
- nathanaldensr 4y ago
  You are correct, and everyone is talking past you. The issue of funding the library is orthogonal to what the library then does with the funding. In the United States, government serves the People, not the other way around, and it's been this way since the US won independence. If the People in a specific legal incorporation do not wish to fund government, then they don't have to. The whys don't actually matter at all. The orthogonal issue is what people who are on the government payroll then do with their tax-money-based salaries. Being government employees, they are subject to the US Constitution and its views on right to free speech, religion, etc.
matrix_overload 4y ago
Counterexample: I publish a book consisting of 100 pages of repeating word "test" and ask the library to purchase 10 copies of it at $100 per copy. Can the library refusal be treated as censorship? What if I give a $50 kickback to an activist within the library that claims that the book is essential to some cause, but then the board shuts down the proposal? Is that censorship?
- Defletter 4y ago
  If you can find an example of that happening, I'd be glad to comment on it.

Dalewyn 4y ago

I think we need to clarify what's really at play here. The institution in question is a public library, funded by public money (taxes). Because the library operates at the cost of the taxpayers, the library has an implicit obligation to act in a manner satisfactory to the majority of the taxpayers. Ergo, the library operates at the pleasure of the public. Now, you might ask why the taxpayers have such powers over the library? That is because the taxpayers have a right to demand and have their tax dollars be spent in a way that is satisfactory to them. How do the taxpayers exercise their will, you might ask? By voting, as any upstanding citizen would do in a democracy, on measures that would allocate tax dollars to the library. And vote they did: 62% nays to 37% yays. In summary, this is not censorship; not the least because the audience for the library in question are the voters who voted against its continued funding. This is simply the public exercising their right to decide how their taxes that they paid are used.

danaris 4y ago
No, the library has an obligation to act in the interest of the public. Not for the pleasure of the public. Your logic clearly invites the tyranny of the majority.
- Dalewyn 4y ago
  No, the library cannot demand how other people spend their money. If it's funded by public money, it operates at the pleasure of the public.
mcphage 4y ago
This is amazing, instead of censorship being something the state does, you've talked yourself around to a position where the state can't possibly do censorship.
- Dalewyn 4y ago
  Censorship is when a third-party to communications comes in and dictates what communiques may be exchanged by the other parties. Such as a government coming in and regulating speech, or a communication medium coming in and regulating what can be exchanged upon its infrastructure. This chain of events isn't censorship because the people defunding the library are quite literally the people the library serves. There is no third-party. The very people the library serves decided, democratically in a free and fair election, the library was not worth continued funding. This is akin to someone blocking another person on a communication medium because they don't like them, which is within their rights. I'm just as against censorship as any other free speech advocate you can find, but calling this an infringement of free speech is disingenuous at best. The library is still free to collect and exhibit whatever books it wants; it just can't bill the people it serves, the taxpayers, for those books anymore.
salawat 4y ago
Nope. You want a Library, you get a Library. A Library is a cache of information and knowledge, and it is guaranteed at least some is going to be disagreeable to you. That's a certainty. Knowledge hurts, or is otherwise unpleasant and character challenging at times. That's the point! The same reason the Public University is viewed as being a bastion for the free exercise and pursuit of controversial ideas, so too is the Public Library. I will never understand the mentality that makes people think Libraries are there to please you, or serve as ideological echo chambers. It's like you've never spoken with a Librarian before.
- Dalewyn 4y ago
  I think you're misunderstanding where I stand. I don't disagree with the purpose of a library, which is to collect and exhibit information as curated by librarians for the purposes of enriching the public; whether the public likes it or not. The problem here is, while libraries have a right to collect and exhibit whatever they please, in this case the library is doing so using tax dollars. This means that the taxpayers, the public, has an authoritative say on how the library operates with that money. So the taxpayers, being dissatisfied with the way their tax dollars were being used, rightfully voted to cut off further funding. The library is free to exercise its right to free expression, but it got told to do so on its own dime. Essentially, anything that operates off of Other Peoples' Money(tm) operates at the pleasure of those people. Certain rights can and should be exercised by such institutions, but the Other Peoples can also choose to then redirect their money elsewhere because it's their money and they rightfully get to choose how it's spent.
nathanaldensr 4y ago
You are correct, and everyone is talking past you. The issue of funding the library is orthogonal to what the library then does with the funding. In the United States, government serves the People, not the other way around, and it's been this way since the US won independence. If the People in a specific legal incorporation do not wish to fund government, then they don't have to. The whys don't actually matter at all. The orthogonal issue is what people who are on the government payroll then do with their tax-money-based salaries. Being government employees, they are subject to the US Constitution and its views on right to free speech, religion, etc.

matrix_overload 4y ago

Counterexample: I publish a book consisting of 100 pages of repeating word "test" and ask the library to purchase 10 copies of it at $100 per copy. Can the library refusal be treated as censorship? What if I give a $50 kickback to an activist within the library that claims that the book is essential to some cause, but then the board shuts down the proposal? Is that censorship?

Defletter 4y ago
If you can find an example of that happening, I'd be glad to comment on it.