On Sun, 31 Aug 2003, Anonymous wrote:
Some librarians are probably now thinking they have a patriotic duty to see what people are reading and to report any "suspicious" behavior. Part of the intent of the Patriot Act and the Library Awareness Program was to bamboozle the nation's librarians into acting as the kind of "ward watchers" that were once so common in the Soviet Union (the babushkas who sat on each floor of apartment buildings and filed reports on the comings and goings of their flock).
The purpose of this is purely a show and indoctrination.
1. No self-respecting terrorist would go to a fucking library to do terror reading (maybe there is something positive here - I think that we should get protected by pigs from extremely dumb terorists.)
The risk is not one "terrorists" have to fear. The biggest problem with the librarian narc program is the same as most of these anti-terrorism measures: completely innocent people are harassed, arrested, or placed under suspicion. You won't catch a terrorist learning to be evil at a library, but you might wrongfully snare an innocent citizen who happens to have an interest in "bad" books. How long until this program is extended to include anyone checking out any book that some part of the US law enforcement body deems bad? If you read Pikhal, do you end up on a watch list? -MW-