The board of the Marple (Pa.) Public Library voted unanimously January 29 to retain seven books on sexuality whose presence in the collection had aroused the ire of an area patron and the local chapter of a national family-values group. “We feel the books met the criteria we have set for book selection,” board President Marcy Abrams noted in the February 2 Delaware County Daily Times, adding, “They are back where they belong in the Dewey system.”
In December, Glenn Mills resident Jack Whoriskey was upset at finding several books on sexuality in the new book section while searching for material about the Atkins diet. He checked out the titles and showed them to elected officials, as well as Kathy Coll of the Delaware County Pro-Life Coalition, declining to complete a request-for-reconsideration form.
Abrams explained at the meeting that because trustees “never received a complaint,” board members “were not required to look at the books.” She went on to say that as officials of a community library, MPL staffers “want to provide what the community wants and needs.” The contested books, which included Violet Blue’s Ultimate Guide to Fellatio and Sex Toys 101: A Playfully Uninhibited Guide, were purchased within the past 18 months at the completion of a weeding project and assessment of collection strengths and weaknesses.
The board’s vote came two weeks after Coll led an anti-pornography meeting in support of Whoriskey. She told the Daily Times that removal of the titles “was never our expectation or our focus.” Rather, Coll said, her newly formed group, Citizens for the Protection of Children at Libraries, is focusing instead on “the system that let this [acquisition] happen.”
Posted February 6, 2004.