Diary of a Wolfeman

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Florida Librarian Suspended over Porn Incident
The director of the Valparaiso (Fla.) Community Library was suspended without pay in early August after city officials found that a registered sex offender had used library computers to access pornographic websites.

This pisses me off on so many levels I can’t believe it. Aauugghh!!

1.) It is unbelievable that a county library system would be asked to censor patron’s use of the facilities. Maybe Oregon libraries are just liberal about these things, but the libraries here do not censor anything, whether it be print, audio or video. They even carry a selection of erotic magazines, such as Playboy. You have to prove you’re over 18 to check one out, but they are there. Oregonian kids can at least go to the library to learn about sex when their parents won’t talk to them. A library should be a repository for all data, not just what some jerk in office deems appropriate. It is the parent’s job to monitor what their children see and hear, not the government’s. Get your head out of your ass and stop trying to nanny the nation.

2.) It pisses me off that an elected official is so amazingly ignorant about the realities of the Internet that they belive it is possible to completely filter out pornography from the terminals in the library. This is IMPOSSIBLE. Period. Sure, you can filter out the lion’s share of it, but we’re talking about a world-wide system with very little supervision. I simply cannot tolerate that kind of ignorance in an elected official of any stripe – whoever was involved in passing that particular policy needs to be whipped.

3.) The article mentions that the patron was a registered sex offender. I don’t recall being asked about my criminal history when I signed up for a library card, so just how the fuck were the librarians supposed to know? Do you want them to memorize the names and faces of all sex offenders so they can keep them away form the porn? And why the hell is he a registered sex offender and not a lifer in the first place – who let this asshat out of jail?

Just too pissed to write more.