Hustler Magazine Challenge, Week 2

[Filtering Facts]

>>No way you can claim "only for
>>economic reasons we do not subscribe to Hustler" now.
>
>Nick Arnett wrote:
>This is not so.  They can claim a perfectly rational economic justification
>-- they have better things to do.  "Opportunity costs" are real costs, which
>you can't remove until you pay for *everything* that a library considers
>more important than putting Hustler on its shelves.  I take it for granted
>that they don't think it's important.
>
>Whether or not we all agree on filtering, I think we do agree that
>librarians are entrusted by the public to use their time and other resources
>responsibly.  Going along with this straw man offer would be a waste of time
>for just about any librarian.
>

But this isn't a case of opportunity cost, since the library isn't being
offered the opportunity to purchase anything but "Hustler".

Also, your argument acknowledges that librarians consider pornography less
appropriate than other things, nearly admiting that there is an
appropriateness issue with "Hustler" in libraries.

There is also the issue of "representititve samples": libraries try to draw
a  sample of genres they would not normally collect, and would do so if
offered for free, as in this case.

David

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David Burt, Filtering Facts, HTTP://WWW.FILTERINGFACTS.ORG
David_Burt at filteringfacts.org