Washington - Way to be!

Here's a news article that I LOVED reading! Washington (the state, not the capital) just made the news regarding this library porn issue on seattlepi.com.

Apparently, the ACLU had sued against filtering porn in the library (big surprise, right?) and the State Supreme Court ruled in favor of filters, stating "Public libraries in Washington can filter Internet content to block things like pornography..."

What a lovely victory! Here's a snippet from the article regarding their decision, "A public library has traditionally and historically enjoyed broad discretion to select materials to add to its collection of printed materials for its patrons' use. We conclude that the same discretion must be afforded a public library to choose what materials from millions of Internet sites it will add to its collection and make available to its patrons," the opinion said. "A public library has never been required to include all constitutionally protected speech in its collection and has traditionally had the authority, for example, to legitimately decline to include adult-oriented material such as pornography in its collection. This same discretion continues to exist with respect to Internet materials."

Click here for the complete article.

Unfortunately, even if the Illinois Supreme Court had a similar decision, it's unlikely the Chicago Public Library Commissioner (Mary Dempsey) and Board of Directors would use it to protect those in our public libraries that don't want to see second-hand porn. Based on her interview with WGN back in 2008, Dempsey thinks she "has no ability to control it." Tsk, tsk.
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