• notsure
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    11517 days ago

    the single most important reason for libraries to be freely accessible…maybe why certain folks want them to go away

    • @[email protected]
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      17 days ago

      If libraries didn’t already exist, to people in the USA they’d sound like some kind of socialist fever dream.

      A place where anybody can go to borrow media for free? Paid with my tax dollars?

      • @[email protected]
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        1717 days ago

        I say this all the time! I use it to try to discredit conservatives when they make up reasons why we can’t have good things. Like, look, you love the library, and you know conservatives would make up all sorts of reasons why it couldn’t ever work. When they’re going on about how free buses (or whatever) couldn’t work, it’s the same

      • notsure
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        117 days ago

        Benjamin Franklin was a lover of life, and he seemed to think that books helped to love life…I honestly can’t believe he was so influential as to create one of the finest institutions on the planet. Remember, he hung out with slavers…

  • @[email protected]
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    1517 days ago

    Trying to decide which anxiety DDC to look at first would give me anxiety lol.

    I had to look it up:

    152.4 Psychology > Perception, movement, emotions, drives > Emotions and feelings

    155.5 Psychology > Perception, movement, emotions, drives > Psychology of young adults

    616.8 Medical sciences and medicine > Diseases > Diseases of the nervous system and mental disorders

    • @[email protected]
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      16 days ago

      We do deserve librarians.

      For people dealing with or processing systemic trauma, this directory isn’t a luxury or a stretch goal feature, it’s an essential accessibilty feature.

      There are a few things I’d add to that list, like burnout, disability, and neurodivergence, but it’s a good start.

      We gotta raise the bar, it’s been in hell for too long now.

  • @[email protected]
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    17 days ago

    Not to discredit this but I feel like maybe there should be a directory about all topics with shelf numbers and not just about hard to talk about topics?
    As a library, you should give me a directory where I can find anything I want. And these topics could be included in that one directory and not singled out in the middle where anyone looking at it can be targeted by some fucking bigot.

    • @[email protected]OP
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      917 days ago

      Yes, but any librarian you might ask for the directory, is going to ask you what you are looking for.

      • @[email protected]
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        117 days ago

        Not if im crippled with social phobias, or dont want to bother a busy person at their desk. Also, the librarian at our school 30 years ago was an evil bitch which made me swear off reading books altogether.

        • @[email protected]
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          817 days ago

          The librarian at your school 30 years ago probably also taught you about the card catalogue and the Dewey Decimal System.

        • @[email protected]
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          817 days ago

          You’re probably not telling the total truth, but maybe consider that one person being unpleasant 30 years ago isn’t a good reason to abandon an entire form of media for your entire life. Let it go. The librarian is probably dead by now, and they don’t have to matter to you anymore.

        • SteveM
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          116 days ago

          Friendly Mod remider to keep our community welcoming to all and please adhere to the guidelines on our main page and engage in discussions without using using sexist terminology.

          no bigotry, including racism, sexism, ableism, transphobia, homophobia or xenophobia;

        • @[email protected]
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          17 days ago

          Every library I’ve been to in the past decade has had computers everywhere that can search their catalog, and even check out books & media yourself. My library also has a 3D printing and craft room, an esports room, and lots of accessibility tools and conveniences for both mental and physical needs.

    • @[email protected]
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      2117 days ago

      If someone is going to single you out for looking at list that includes “cancer”, “divorce” and “loss of a parent” they didn’t need a reason to target you in the first place.

    • peto (he/him)
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      1717 days ago

      And there generally is, most libraries have a catalogue or at least a directory explaining the numbering system at a topic level. Thing is, this sign doesn’t just help people come to the library wanting help with these things. It helps people in the library who are experiencing this and didn’t know they could find a book to help them.

      Hell some people don’t even know they need help with these things until someone offers.

    • @[email protected]
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      3117 days ago

      It’s just the Dewey Decimal System, so you could look up whatever topic you like to find what it would be classified under. There’s thousands of topics that are covered here - there’s a reason it’s used for every non-fiction clarification in a library - that would be far too numerous to list on a single shelf listing. This library has chosen to prioritize the awkward questions as a way to help someone who otherwise may not know how to get help.

      Alternatively, most libraries have a catalogue you can search by keyword and it will give you book results which will let you know where they are on the shelves. But again, that requires you to know that the catalogue exists and how to use it. It’s always going to be easier to ask a librarian, who can make sure you find something to help.

  • John-Mark Gurney
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    2017 days ago

    @MrMakabar
    #AltText

    Sign at end of library shelf:
    Nervous about asking
    ABORTION 363.46
    ABUSE 362.76
    ALCOHOL 362.29, 813.81
    ANXIETY 152.46, 155.5, 616.85 BULLYING 303.69
    CANCER 616.99
    CHILD CUSTODY 343.73 CUTTING/SELF HARM 616.85 DEPRESSION 616.85
    DIVORCE 306.89
    DRUGS 362.29, 613.8
    EATING DISORDERS 616.85
    HIV/AIDS 616.97
    LOSS OF A PARENT 306.87, 155.9
    MENTAL ILLNESS 616.89
    POST TRAMATIC STRESS 616.85
    PREGNANCY 306.87, 618.2
    RAPE 362.88
    SELF-ESTEEM 185.1, 305.23 SEX 613.9
    STIs 616.95

    1/2

    • @[email protected]
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      617 days ago

      Our state is trying. The trash have some coward called ‘Book Ban dan’. The coward doesn’t like free speech and has the morals of a serial killer. He is just working his way up to the name ‘Book Burning dan’ Trash gravitates toward power and there are no checks and balances left for that. That idiot is selling that books about ‘the gay’ are making people that way. I wonder what book he read that made him a spineless coward?

      • @[email protected]
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        217 days ago

        My state has a ‘Ron’ but otherwise I’d have suspected they were the same person, based on the description.

  • JollyBrancher
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    1317 days ago

    Yeahhh we’re gonna need a 741.6 as well…

    But for real, things like this are great. Local elections ALWAYS matter. Just an unfortunately large amount more than ever.

  • @[email protected]
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    8217 days ago

    Federal library funding is under threat— So go support one of the last remaining public spaces. It’s an outdated idea, somewhere a human can exist without having to spend money.

    • @[email protected]
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      3117 days ago

      I took my young kid to a recent library event - the first time I’ve been to a library in several years, to be honest - and overheard the organizer (or leader or whatever) of the event saying “that’s why we’re here: to give people somewhere safe they can have entertainment for free.”

      I didn’t have much in the way of an opinion on that person prior to that, positive or negative, but I respected the hell out of them after hearing them say that.

  • Remy Rose
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    5917 days ago

    In order for things like this to keep being offered, please keep an eye on your local library’s board and director. Ours are terrible, and gleefully destroying all our similar initiatives… Recent events have them feeling very empowered to do so.

    • @[email protected]
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      1017 days ago

      Also, consider picking up a job like that too or running for a seat on such boards. There’s always too few applicants for such roles and extremists have an easy time enacting change.

  • @[email protected]
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    2917 days ago

    So refreshing seeing those words actually used in a public setting. Suicide instead of “self unaliving”, rape instead of “grape”, etc. Maybe I really am chronically online