Letters to the Editor: Banned Books or Not, Reading Has Benefits

Banned Books or Not, Reading Has Benefits
Editor, Times-Dispatch: I am writing to thank Correspondent of the Day Brian Regrut ["Why Are So Many Books Banned?"] for his timely warning (coming at the end of Banned Books Week) about why so many works of literature are removed or kept from library shelves.

I will be certain to chastise the ideologue librarians to whom Regrut refers (and, of course, the secretive book-selection cabals they head) whenever I next have contact with them, as I regularly do in my role as an educator.

In all seriousness, though, to any professional librarian, Regrut's letter must surely have smacked of the all-too frequent complaints they receive regarding certain literature in their library. On many occasions, it is subsequently revealed that the plaintiff has not even read the book he or she is challenging. Similarly, I was left asking myself whether Regrut has ever actually spoken to a real librarian about the book selection process.

Regardless of whether people have a right to keep books off the shelves of school or community libraries, the real issue is that reading has huge benefits, and that is the message that needs to be promoted. As was reported online recently, researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have found that reading increases vocabulary much more than talking or direct teaching. It substantially boosts general knowledge while decreasing the likelihood that misinformation will be absorbed; and it helps keep memory and reasoning abilities intact as we age.

Thinking about these benefits, perhaps having selfish people attempting to censor and dictate what other people read is not such a bad thing for the promotion of reading after all. As the United Kingdom's Guardian newspaper wrote the other day, publicity about a certain book's status as one of the most challenged of all time helped drive that book to the top of the Amazon sales chart.

Stuart Gapper.
Richmond.

. . .

In my experience, librarians take seriously their responsibility to build a diverse collection with the tax dollars of the citizens they serve. In public libraries, you will find Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter, and Sean Hannity as well as Al Gore, Barack Obama, and Edward Kennedy.

We don't have enough money to buy every book or film we would like to provide, but we do provide materials to offend almost every viewpoint. Creating a balanced and diverse collection is, of course, a never-ending job.

We may not achieve perfection, but in my experience, librarians do take it seriously, and do not refuse to buy a book based on personal dislike.

Chris Wiegard.
Chester.

Under current law Virginia would get no federal revenue from drilling off Virginia. There is no revenue-sharing with states other than a few in the Gulf of Mexico and attempts to change those laws have failed. Second, offshore drilling in all the areas that were under moratorium could not generate the huge revenues and number of jobs that the author predicts.

In 2007, the federal Energy Information Agency predicted that if all the Outer Continental Shelf areas were open for leasing and drilling, we would increase production of oil by around 2 percent to 3 percent by 2030. This is not enough oil and gas to create the economic growth and job creation claimed in the article.

What is off Virginia's coast is an important test and training range for the Navy, a vibrant fishery worth over $100 million per year, an area used by NASA's growing Wallops Island rocket launch facility, and a significant portion of the Chesapeake Bay's blue crabs. So is all that worth one-tenth of 1 percent of the oil we use on an annual basis?

You be the judge. J.R. Tolbert. Richmond.