Exclusives

EXCLUSIVE: New National Association Launched To Compete With American Library Association

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• A new national organization has been launched as an alternative to the American Library Association, according to a Monday press release obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation. 
• The World Library Association will provide assistance to parents involved in legal battles over sexually explicit content within public and school libraries, the press release stated. 
• “The World Library Association would like to provide some kind of counterbalance to this big group that has been pushing these inappropriate books that they have been for decades,” Dan Kleinman, a self-proclaimed “library watchdog” and founder of the World Library Association, told the DCNF.

A new national organization that seeks to serve as an alternative to the American Library Association (ALA) launched Monday, according to a press release obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Dan Kleinman, a self-proclaimed “library watchdog” who has run a website for more than ten years documenting political activism within libraries, has founded the World Library Association, the second nationwide library association and a competitor to the ALA, according to the press release. The World Library Association, open to public and school libraries, will offer financial support and assistance to parents involved in legal battles over sexually explicit content within public and school libraries, Kleinman told the DCNF.

“The World Library Association is going to be able to attract donations from big donors on the other side because somebody has to do something to give some kind of help to parents and communities or else the nationwide effect of the harm done to children with this inappropriate material is going to be huge,” Kleinman told the DCNF. “The World Library Association would like to provide some kind of counterbalance to this big group that has been pushing these inappropriate books that they have been for decades.”

The World Library Association aims to provide model policies, trainings and assistance based on “political neutrality” and “common sense” to public and school libraries, Kleinman told the DCNF.

“School policies right now recommend, basically that anything goes and that it’s literally age discrimination to keep a child from any material,” Kleinman told the DCNF. “New policy guidance from the World Library Association is going to recommend that schools follow laws or case laws like Board of Education vs. Pico, a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court case that allows schools to remove educationally unsuitable and pervasively vulgar materials and to do so immediately. So schools now can have books that are for children that comply with common sense, the law and community standards, instead of what’s going on in the news right now.”

The ALA has more than 50,000 members, mostly public librarians, the organization website states. Members of the ALA have access to professional development courses as well as “access to top-notch resources [and] tools.”

The ALA has recently come under fire following a resurfaced tweet by the organization president who called herself a “Marxist lesbian.” On July 11, the Montana State Library (MSL) Commission voted to leave the ALA over the president’s tweet, becoming the first state to do so.

Mississippi and Idaho Republicans have called on their state to cut ties with the ALA over concerns of the “Marxist lesbian” president following the MSL vote. Since 2015, the state of Mississippi has given the ALA nearly $70,000 of taxpayer funds, a press release stated.

“I just cannot believe that a Marxist lesbian who believes that collective power is possible to build and can be wielded for a better world is president elect of [ALA],” Emily Drabinski, the newly elected president, wrote in a now-deleted tweet, according to the College Fix. “I am so excited for what we will do together. Solidarity. And my mom is so proud I love you mom.”

“[The ALA’s] goal is to use and normalize sexual materials as a divisive, manipulative kind of construct between parents and kids, and their strategy isn’t working,” Shawn McBreairty, World Library Association board member told the DCNF. “The World Library Association is going to help parents with an unbiased and conservative agenda and just get back to regular education, the basics of what we all used to think a library was when we were a kid.”

In April, the ALA celebrated its efforts to defend pornographic books in schools, releasing a list of the most challenged content in an effort to recognize the “brave authors.” The ALA announced in June that it would spend at least $1 million to challenge parents in court who challenge explicit content within libraries, according to the American Libraries Magazine.

The ALA did not immediately respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.