Letter to the editor: Book banning harms society

The U.S. Supreme Court recently denied an appeal to hear a case involving a Texas public library banning a collection of books from distribution to the public. According to USA Today, the titles involved controversial topics like slavery and LGBTQ+ issues. It was argued that “if a disappointed patron can’t find a book in the library, he can order it online, buy it from a bookstore, or borrow it from a friend … . That is what it means to be a library — to make judgments about which books are worth reading and which are not, which ideas belong on the shelves and which do not.”

This ruling is troublesome because in 2025, ideas, whether you agree with them or not, should not be censored, meaning that no library should be able to remove books that don’t “fit within their collection.” Arguing that questionable material can be bought somewhere else is not a substantial argument because not every person can access technology- reliant material.

The purpose of a public library is to help the public learn, debate and engage with new ideas. Books help educate the public about a wide array of topics. Reading them, whether you agree with them or not, should be up to the discretion of the reader, not library officials.

As Walter Cronkite said, “whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation.”

Ashton Caldwell

Cheswick