I’m not a fan of the United States as a country right now and for reasons that go beyond the current administration and its rapid descent into fascism (although that’s a big part of things). I do try not to hold that against institutions, organizations, or individuals that just happen to be based in the United States, unless, of course, the institution, organization, or individual in question is doing what it can to support or enable that descent.
That disclaimer out of the way, Banned Books Week, an annual campaign by the American Library Association, is something that should get taken up in some fashion by everyone who actually values freedom of thought, expression, or speech. No one gets to tell me what I’m allowed to read. No one gets to decide what my children or grandchildren are allowed to read. Never in recorded history have the people trying to ban books or limit thought have those people turned out to be the good guys.
Freedom to Read Week, a Canadian equivalent (ish – it’s a bit broader in focus by my interpretation) happens the last full week in February, so I’ll draw attention to that when the time comes too, as I should have in previous years.
There’s no reason not to have this sort of campaign twice in a year. Or more.
Typically, to my reading, books are challenged more in school libraries than in public libraries in Canada, though it does happen in public libraries too, and mainly because certain parents think that not only can they get away with it, they have a right to try to dictate what the rest of us read, do, and think. There’s a big difference between challenging what your child can read and trying to force everyone’s children to conform to that. Such challenges should always constitute fighting words.
It’s hard to find a list of “most challenged books in Canada” or “books challenged in Canada in 2026” but you can come up with more general ones or less current ones. From the searches I did while writing this post (because I didn’t just want to go with the standard targets), I like the this one from the North Perth Public Library and this one from a CBC article last year. Oddly, I’ve read at least half of the books on both lists, some of them under duress during high school, but most of my own free will. The ones I haven’t either aren’t to my taste or, in two cases, because the authors in question have proven themselves to be poor excuses for human beings and I have no desire to support their work in any way.
The reasons a book gets challenged usually come down to the challenger being offended by the content. Whether that’s due to “offensive” language, sex/sexuality, violence, or religious/political views, my response is nearly always the same: so what? Why does any one person think they should get to be the arbiter for everyone? They have every right to their opinion and every right to choose for themselves. Sending a child to a public school should actually mean a deferment of the right to decide what’s taught in favour of what society has collectively decided should be what’s taught, but we see time and again that a lot of people don’t think that way. So if someone want to decide what it’s okay for their child to read or experience or think, we give ground on that and unfortunately have to let the child sort things out in therapy or difficult relationships later in life.
Never mind that I promise I can find something offensive about whatever book is nearest and dearest to the challenger’s heart, I don’t believe that everyone else has to cater to what one person finds offensive. I can respect that the person or group has different opinions and beliefs and I can respect that they can adhere to those opinions and beliefs for themselves, but I have absolutely no respect for the attempt to enforce those opinions and beliefs on anyone else and will fight about it in any context. My local school board seems to either not engage in book challenges or keeps them so completely under the radar that it never gets reported (and everything gets reported somewhere eventually).
So Banned Books Week in early autumn and Freedom to Read Week in late winter. For the early autumn edition, I’m probably not going to pick a banned book that I haven’t read, but I might select several that I have read and sneak them into local Little Free Libraries or leave them places in the wild that they might get picked up by the right people. In both cases, those could get retrieved by the very people who want to ban them, but that’s actually okay. Either someone who needs or appreciates the book will read it or I’ve ruined the day of someone who needs more of their days ruined to make them think about things a little more. It’s a win-win, I think.
Be well, everyone.
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