We have covered it before: school districts across the United States
are increasingly censoring books that don';t align with white-washed conservative visions of the world. Art Spiegelman';s Maus, The
Illustrated Diary of Anne Frank, Alice Walker';s The Color Purple, Toni Morrison';s The Bluest Eye, and Harper Lee';s To Kill a
Mockingbird-these are some of the many books getting pulled from
library shelves in American schools. In response to this concerning
trend, the Brooklyn Public Library has made a bold move: For a limited
time, the library will offer a free eCard to any person aged 13 to 21
across the United States, allowing them free access to 500,000 digital
books, including many censored books. The Chief Librarian for the
Brooklyn Public Library, Nick Higgins said:

A public library represents all of us in a pluralistic society we exist
with other people, with other ideas, other viewpoints and perspectives
and that';s what makes a healthy democracy - not shutting down access
to those points of view or silencing voices that we don';t agree with,
but expanding access to those voices and having conversations and ideas
that we agree with and ideas that we don';t agree with.

And he added:

This is an intellectual freedom to read initiative by the Brooklyn
Public Library. You know, we';ve been paying attention to a lot of the
book challenges and bans that have been taking place, particularly over
the last year in many places across the country. We don';t necessarily experience a whole lot of that here in Brooklyn, but we know that there
are library patrons and library staff who are facing these and we
wanted to figure out a way to step in and help, particularly for young
people who are seeing, some books in their library collections that may represent them, but they';re being taken off the shelves.

As for how to get the Brooklyn Public Library';s free eCard, their
Books Unbanned website offers the following instructions: "individuals
ages 13-21 can apply for a free BPL eCard, providing access to our full
eBook collection as well as our learning databases. To apply, email booksunbanned@bklynlibrary.org." In short, send them an email.

You can find a list of America';s most frequently banned books at the
website of the American Library Association.

And if you would like to support the mission of Open Culture, consider making a donation to our site. It';s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your contributions will help us continue providing the best cultural and
educational materials to learners everywhere. You can contribute
through PayPal, Patreon, Venmo (@openculture) and Crypto. Thanks for
your support!

https://www.openculture.com/2022/08/the-brooklyn-public-library-gives-every-teenager-in-the-u-s-free-access-to-books-getting-censored-by-american-schools.html
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