For those of us who have been in the SLIS program for a while the idea of deciding how library facilities can be used and by whom is not a new one. There are several classes that speak to managerial issues like policy making. One of the decisions that is made is how meeting rooms can be used and by whom. While looking through sources for this week's blogs I came across the OIF Blog that was informing libraries about a letter writing campaign lead by the ADF. The letter writing has been followed up by legal action by the ADF in some cases. The ADF claims that by excluding religious groups from using meeting rooms libraries are infringing upon those group's rights. The ADF has not just homed in on libraries, but government facilities of all kinds. The institutions listed on its website included libraries, schools, and community centers. While the ADF is focused on the rights of Christian groups, the language used in parts of its arguments would be as applicable to any religious group. The group has one many of its suits regarding such policies. The question I wanted to pose with this posting was do such policies actually infringe upon the rights of religious groups? Since most policies (I would assume all, but I hate to assume anything. You know what assuming does.) restrict all religious groups equally are they unfair policies? I also began to wonder how these policies would treat a request for use by an atheistic group. I've taken a couple of course where such policies were talked about, but I never really considered the question from an IF standpoint. Mostly for this post I wanted to highlight this issue and see what other people think about what is happening.
ADF
OIF Offers Assistance to Libraries Receiving Letters on Meeting Room Policies
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I noticed that no one has yet commented so I wanted to jump in with my two cents. I'm not sure what you all talk about in your management courses, but from an intellectual freedom perspective, if your library allows one civic group to meet, your library should allow all civic groups to meet. The interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights as it relates to meeting rooms can be found in the IFM on pages 187-188, but it specifically encourages librarians to be inclusive of religious groups when writing policies. The fact that there was an "incident" in which the ADF had to complain in the first place is troubling...
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