Libraries! Should the government shut most of them down and cut the fat as most are not used?

[Good_white_girl]

Let's be honest its 2020 and libraries are past their sell by date. Anything they do can be done by your phone of other organisations. They are essentially giant expensive empty buildings with a huge carbon footprint. Ever notice how libraries are where weirdos, drug users, alcoholics, drug dealers and perverts congregate. Better to find buildings where the homeless can sleep at night.

Yes

No

Triggered! I do drugs and fornication in the library!!!

[Passinggas]

Just imagine some world cataclysm occurs that takes out the internet, all servers fried. I guess we should have google monitoring our ever thought and compiling a control database for the forces to be. If they close the libraries then we should have book-burning bonfires in the streets to symbolize this step in “progress.” While the internet is extremely convenient, books buried deep in the archives still don’t see the light of day on it. The internet is the absolute control device over censorship once a controlling authority seeks to filter it and there are no options for literature resources. Google is the worst censorship known to date. Therefore, I say the library remains the back up over convenience.

[Good_white_girl]

If there was some world cataclysm the books would be burnt to keep warm, of soaked by extreme weather or burnt after the library catches fire.
Ever read a book from the great library of Alexandria?

[Passinggas]

Nope, an electrical storm, or ionic bombardment from the sun could kill it all without fire, or water.

[Good_white_girl]

Cities would burn, roofs would collapse, people would freeze.

[tartaarsaus]

Nope. Available libraries offer easy access to books, both for education but also art and culture, are places where people can meet (bit of social function) and it’s useful for kids who want to read especially.

I’m fine with some millions going towards libraries, it’s a relatively insignificant expenditure. If you wanna cut government expenditure, there are more productive ways to cut spending instead of going after insignificant expenditures that are sold more easily to the public.

Oh and “ever notice how libraries are where weirdos, drug users, alcoholics, drug dealers and perverts congregate” is just nonsense.

[Primrose21]

I've just here for the xper points. Lol

[Good_white_girl]

And you shall have them my dear lol

[hellacray]

No I think that's dumb. Libraries is a free resource not just reading books for pleasure. You can look up things that's not easily accessible online. Like a directory of local manufacturers.

Also some of the information there you know is legit. Whereas online information could be biased because they're trying to sell something.

Also it's a nice quiet place to study and they have meeting rooms. I personally hate studying at coffee shops cause I get distracted.

[Good_white_girl]

Nothing is free. Somebody must always pay.

[hellacray]

So... What you think getting rid of all libraries is going to lower taxes?

They'll just spend that money somewhere else. And if you live in San Francisco it's probably on something stupid and unecessary.

[Astarlessnightsky]

The thing is libaries are not an organisation, they are non-profit and they aren't biased to anything.

And espacially a libary of an university has so much more books to offer than even the specialiced university intranet.

And i don't know where you live, but i have never seen a homeless guy or drug addict inside a libary.

[Matthew2222]

Your write up seems to give rise to an excellent counter-plan, namely, remove the various riffraff that accumulates in libraries to make them safe and welcoming places again. Libraries are not redundant, as most books are not readily available for free anywhere else. For a society that has a crisis arising from a shortage of education, eliminating libraries to save what amounts to pocket change is a quixotic solution. Or a classically liberal one.

[oldguyincanada]

I think something like $20 of my property tax goes towards funding the library. I'll risk it being "fat". I have not been in it for years, but that is because it is a small rural facility and I personally own books numbering about 1/5 the number of books in the library, books that match my interests. If I still lived in a city, I would still be a library user.

[jamesBen]

No! My sister and I are amateur genealogists. We get free access to the Library Edition of both Ancestry. co. uk and Find My Past. That enables so much research to be done from within a mile of our home.

[XavierSteele]

Just because most of this generation is to retarded to go read something doesn't mean something should be shut down. Why not shut down the post office? They lose money all the time. Last I checked most libraries are funded by public sources not government. Hmm, see this is why they should not be closed most people lack a fundamental education

[Soteris]

No, Libraries are important community centers and have a vast amount of uses for the government ranging from just being a library to allowing people to rent out meeting rooms as well as important government buildings in case of emergency situations.

[Good_white_girl]

We have community centres.

[Soteris]

Yes, and Libraries are often also one. They work really well together.

[Anonymous]

What is it with stupid people always beefin' with libraries?

[blondfrog]

Libraries are good we need them.