Missouri Votes to Completely Defund Public Libraries

This will the goal.

Big deal. So few there can read anyway.

R1 Ok

As a librarian myself, I'm surprised public libraries have lasted as long as they have in the US (where they originate from), especially in the red states. I've always thought of them as being on borrowed time.

*Missouri Votes to Stay in the Dark Ages

FTFY

Disgusting.

😞 I agree, R4, but it's a sad day. I wasn't sure it would come this soon.

Florida must be so jealous right now.

It's Missouri.

Have they sorted out what they're going to do with all three books?

When will anyone with brains in the south realize they need to get the fuck out of these backwater asscrack states?

I think that's sad. Wow, as a kid I was always at the Library and thank God I had that. I guess with the internet and online books kids don't need the Library. One of these days though, people will wish they still existed.

Every Republican in the country is screaming about the "Soros-backed DA"...while trying to hide that they are passing cut-and-paste legislation.

Every accusation is a confession

The place is full of fat hillbillies, what do you expect? My state will be next.

Fucking goddamn fascists are enemies of America.

MAGAtards bitch about how "GYNA!" is so technologically ahead of us. How their doctors and specialists are all "brown". Yet, they continue to devalue education and close libraries in their rancid red states. They look around at their shithole states, with the dwindling and aging population and wonder: why are the young leaving? Why are those who remain on drugs? Fucking dumbasses.

As a Missourian, I hereby pronounce r9 the winner. Your prize includes dinner at a "classy" sit-down restaurant, where you will choose between KC barbecue, that gross-ass pizza from St. Louis, or Ozark roadkill. For dessert, we'll have s'mores -- where the marshmallows will be roasted over the flames of a good ol' fashioned burning of our three remaining books.

R16 Can we go to Walmart for stretch pants afterward?

I wuz hopin' for sumthin fancy like the Cracker Barrel.

Yes, you may have a choice of either stretch pants from Walmart or a new pair of work gloves from Tractor Supply Company. Sales tax is to be paid by the winner.

R19, you talkin about Imo's pizza?

P.S. to R10, Missouri is not in the South.

[quote]P.S. to [R10], Missouri is not in the South.

That is a purely geographic statement not a reflection of reality...

Missouri is obviously working hard in competition against Florida to make sure their students are the dumbest in the nation.

Well I never in all my life!

Suck it Librarians!

Thanks R12 for your post. Not on Twitter anymore but that poster is correct. ALEC is the same evil piece of shit org that was planning Trump claiming the election was rigged - seven months before it happened.

Why can't libraries be funded at the local level? Mine is.

I thought libraries were city funded as well.

This is sad. The poor will suffer, of course.

It's Missouri. No surprise. Let Missouri be Missouri. I have zero issue with states wanting to cater to the dull normal. If folks want an education they can move.

It's the 21st Century equivalent of burning books though.

It's a fair question to ask: What place do libraries have in modern society?

Surely the answer has to be, a place to improve adult literacy, a centre for the community and an information hub.

Not everyone has the internet at home. There are lots of people excluded from it. Libraries should be places where people can go and learn skills and of course read.

It’s sad but necessary.

Any major corporation in Misery set to expand? Trying to attract high tech jobs to your state? Well you can kiss all of that good bye

I love my library, and I would really miss the experience they shut it's doors.

I know what we’ll do! We’ll get rich liberals to open a private network of libraries.

Filled with “LGBTQ” and Communism ^.

Yes libraries should get state funds and help immigrants, for example.

Also they can be a way to distribute normally costly paid media to consumers - movie rentals, current newspapers and periodicals, etc.

They should help children explore the range of knowledge and develop intellectual interests. Thats what they did when I was a kid. The public schools did most of that but my library and the librarians I knew there for years were important as well. It was their JOB to help kids explore knowledge - outside the school curriculum. Those idiosyncratic pursuits make a world of difference when one is 15 and thinking about higher education, for example.

Teachers are overworked and concentrating on their curriculums and progress on them. But its perfectly ordinary for a Librarian to help someone explore an interest in whatever. Poetry. History. Space. Natural science. Art and Architecture. Endless possibilities. That schoolteachers can't deal with. Librarians and libraries. These ASSHAT "get the libs" are so corrosive. Delighted to destroy minds.

You're welcome, R25. Jess Piper is an under appreciated tireless advocate for education.

And, here's a tiny bit of hopeful news:

[quote] JUST IN: A federal judge has just ORDERED Llano County Texas to return "all books" that were removed from their libraries due to their content or viewpoint.

[quote] Library patrons successfully argued that "content-based restrictions" were likely unconstitutional.

[quote] The Texas judge is also prohibiting the officials from removing any more books while a lawsuit remains pending.

[quote] The books that were banned included a book for teens that calls the Ku Klux Klan a terrorist group, Isabel Wilkerson’s “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents” and a comedic children’s book with three stories from Dawn McMillan’s “I Need a New Butt!” series.

[quote] The decision could set wide reaching precedent in light of recent book banning in Florida, supported by Ron DeSantis

What was the reason for defunding the libraries? It's a crazy decision.

I go to my local library to get books. It's the main library; it provides a lot of services for people. Libraries are important. I don't know how anyone could not realize that.

[quote] What was the reason for defunding the libraries?

Here's an explainer. I think this guy is a state rep or something.

Missouri produces some of the best gay porn stars. If they want to keep them stupid, I guess that's fine with me.

I'm so glad someone included Missouri's sexiest man Josh Hawley in this topic. I could watch him flex his big biceps and puff out his massive chest all day long.

R29, underage kids don't have the option of just moving out of a state they don't like

Must be something in the water, R41

[quote] Hamm was born on March 10, 1971, in St. Louis, Missouri

Do these retrograde states just not care about attracting business from other states and abroad?

[quote] underage kids don't have the option of just moving out of a state they don't like

Very true.

Mercifully, they can virtually visit Brooklyn, though.

For the love of all that is holy won't someone eat at Taco Bell and then run to R42's house to SHIT IN HIS MOUTH???!?!?!?!?!?!?!

I am an avid reader. I do not, however, go to libraries. The idea of handling a book that has been handled by god only knows how many other people is gross to me. I mean, think of all the sneezes and coughs those pages may have absorbed. People picking their noses while reading or sitting on the can while taking a dump.

I download all my books from Amazon onto my Kindle. Much better.

r48, great, but not everyone has the option of just buying any book they want

r45, I expect there will be a "brain drain" in the red states for passing laws like this, as well as anti-choice laws. They're already experiencing this in Idaho, where they don't have enough doctors in some hospitals to deliver babies

Moreover, R49, The public libraries frequently offer digital copies of the same books FOR FREE!

(see R46)

A lot of very proudly stupid and uneducated people vote GOP. It's really that simple.

This is just part of their plan of attack to produce more GOP voters because their numbers are dwindling.

Here in St. Louis, we have a word for these people: hoosiers.

And it has nothing to do with people from Indiana. Think more along the lines of the n word for white people.

R4, as a librarian, you clearly know nothing about librarians and libraries in 2023. I think you have to be a troll.

Unfortunately it's the hoosiers who run Missouri. While KC, STL and Columbia are blue islands, the rest of the state is packed with mouth-breathing trash.

[quote] This is sad. The poor will suffer, of course.

The poor don't read books.

[quote] with the internet and online books kids don't need the Library. One of these days though, people will wish they still existed.

When do you imagine that "one of these days" will happen?

We cannot foretell the future.

[quote] Not everyone has the internet at home.

No. 93% do.

Look at the stats here—

Reading is for socialists!!!!!!

Posho doesn't read. Or spell.

r60 Isn't English his second language?

That's why I don't say anything about it. That's the only valid excuse, to me.

[quote] I know what we’ll do! We’ll get rich liberals to open a private network of libraries.

R34 That's what millionaire altruist Andrew Carnegie did.

I'm sure the millionaire altruists in The Clinton Foundation and The Obama Foundation would be happy to do the same.

R53, I have a vague, 40 y/o memory of 7th grade Ohio (or American?) history teaching that "hoosier" was a shortened version of Antebellum era, "whose your allegiance".

Does that make any sense?

I want them to start burning books. Get that brain-dead fascism out in the open so we can fight it head on.

Mizzeruh

Re: R40

State Rep. Peter Merideth (D-MO)

And, as the NYPD struggles to pay overtime and misconduct claims, da Mayor is looking to collect that shortfall from the library system.

I tried to find out more about this. A couple newspapers online did not mention it. Elsewhere I read that the Missouri House is working on the state budget and that’s where they eliminated funding for libraries-but- the budget still has to go to the state senate to be passed. So this could be typical GOP posturing.

Thanks, Drag Queens!

Ump

Thank gawd they don’t have to pay for libraries!

I asked an 11 year old girl yesterday if she reads. She said, No.

Why are you talking to 11 year old girls.

^ My grand niece i was going to give a copy of my book too.

To*.

I knew you were going to say “niece”. I was waiting for it. I was going to tell you to use “niece” so you don’t sound so pervy with your lie.

Grand niece. Your messing up your projection. Do better.

You're... In any case, don't derail discussion this important public issue. If you can't contribute meaningfully go find a kardashian thread to bitch in.

R69, your fellow Republicans did this. Not drag queens

They both did it. This is the work of the hard left and hard right. I love it.

R80, you're so full of shit it's not even funny.

Both sides, indeed.

Proud to be both sides. You are a blue Trumper.

Only in your warped little mind, R82.

Always have a soft spot for public libraries and librarians. Such a stupid thing to do. They are going to push people too far. No normal person wants to live in the magat’s world. That’s why they have to cheat to get power.

[quote] Always have a soft spot for public libraries and librarians

The taxpayers should not have to pay for your soft spots.

R18, Don't you be dissin' the Barrel! There are only 5 states without one!

Or at least that's how you interpreted her grunt, r72.

Those two national associations which took the court case are not under the control of the local public libraries. I would be interested in knowing if, say, some state level library association entered into the case or supports it. I don’t know if the case would be won as public entities are ultimately under the control of the government. The notion that local experts (librarians, teachers) who are government officials have complete independence from state control is a relatively novel one. That being said I think some compromise should be reached where local libraries at least try to meet local concerns half way and the funding is restored.

Last week was a committee vote. (in the OP)

Today, the full House voted favorably for an even more extreme bill

[quote] The version that will now head to the State Senate eliminated "not only the $4.5 million Parson had slated for libraries, but also costs for diversity initiatives, childcare and pre-kindergarten programs," Heartland Signal reported.

I think it’s needed^.

^ Why? How could that possibly be?

Libraries are relics.

Libraries are relics of a culture which has died in our century.

No, they're not

[quote] Across the state of Missouri, 11% of the 1,171,293 individuals age 5–19, or approximately 123,754 individuals, don't have broadband Internet at home.

And how many of that percent even use the library.

[quote] don't have broadband Internet at home.

But they do on their iPhone which they carry with them constantly.

White gays always think they know “the poors”. Isn’t that what they’re called here?

The ignorant and uneducated are their basic voting base. Praise Jesus!

Just think how much easier it will be to look rich and thin around the mouthbreathers.

But one needn’t fund what one cannot read (?).

^ Disagree

My grandfather was illiterate and he ALWAYS found a dollar or some change to give me for a book when we visited in the summer. My grandparents also kept a copy of my father's dissertation on the shelf next to their Bible (which they also couldn't read).

Only the selfish don't want their progeny to have better.

This conversation going off on tangent about literacy versus illiteracy.

The crux of the thread is about taking taxpayers' money to fund an elite who want to control childrens' reading.

[quote] Requires 3 years of dysphoria, 18 months of therapy sessions, doesn't allow people with autism/depression.

How can they legislate care for adults?