'Don't Mess With Librarian Twitter' - An Old Internet Proverb

By
Shumita Basu
WNYC News | Jul 26, 2018

The title of the opinion piece was enough to make some people livid.

"Amazon Should Replace Local Libraries to Save Taxpayers Money," wrote Forbes contributor Panos Mourdoukoutas, an economics professor at LIU Post.

(A Forbes spokesperson told WNYC the article has since been removed from the website because it was outside of the contributor's specific area of expertise. However, since this is the internet, you can find a cached version here.)

In his piece, Mourdoukoutas says libraries have become obsolete in the age of coffeeshops and free wifi. He cites a 2017 Pew Research study that found in-person library usage dropped slightly between 2012 and 2016. However, the rest of that study points to the fact that people use libraries for far more than just books, and millennials in America are more likely to have visited a public library in the past year than any other adult generation.

About half of U.S. Millennials have visited a public library or bookmobile in the past year

The backlash on Twitter was swift. But WNYC reached out to one person whose reaction to Mourdoukoutas' piece went viral, mostly because of how well-researched her retort was.

Charlotte Clymer is a press secretary at the Human Rights Campaign. She told WNYC that she felt inclined to look up Mourdoukoutas' local library (in Nassau County) and to inform him of all of the services it provides. It took her about 20 to 30 minutes.

"It took me longer to draft the thread than to do the research," Clymer said. "The library isn't just books; it’s the swiss army knife of a community. It's all things to all people."

Clymer was moved to respond with more than the standard clapback. To her, this wasn't just a 'bad take' opinion piece.

"It seemed like a willfully contrarian point of view that could actually be harmful in some ways," said Clymer. "We’re seeing a capitalist takeover a lot of public services, and I can accept that there might be benefits to isolated solutions, but mostly it's not done with a lot of thought and care. And that really bothers me."

Clymer says public libraries have been a lifelong lifeline to her, from growing up poor in Central Texas and using the library after school, to getting out of the army in 2012 and needing a place to prepare resumes and apply for jobs.

"It's going to sound dramatic, and it's not intended to, but I can't imagine where I'd be if I didn't have the public library way back when."

WNYC's Shumita Basu spoke with Kerry Nolan.

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Shumita Basu

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