According to the Florida mother, her teenage son became traumatized after picking up an adult manga volume at their local library and is now home on extensive therapy.
Despite her claims, the manga the teen pilfered (i.e. he didn’t actually check it out and stole it instead) was shelved at a separate section with other adult manga. My bet is the kid knew they were there, didn’t want his mom to know he was taking it out hence the stealing, and lifted it out of the shelves.
The mother has since been actively been pursuing the banning of manga books within that library due to their “graphic” and “shocking” images and content. She even went to far as to collect a petition but the validity of the 226 signatures are questionable due to the mother’s misrepresentation of the petition; she touted the petition as a protest against pronography.
It is highly unlikely that the library in question will remove their manga books as they are highly demanded and with an active Anime Teen Club at the library, there would be a lot of outcry from patrons.
Personally, I think that those mature manga books should be moved to another location – namely the adults section where they should’ve been placed from the beginning. And this brings up a torn I have about books and video games at libraries. For some weird reason, libraries like to put adult video games and manga in the teen room. What’s up with that? As soon as we become adults, we are no longer are interested in video games or manga for our age group?
Libraries should make appropriate sections for 18+ graphic novels and video games. If you frequent your library, become proactive about it and I’m sure you will get your way because libraries listen to their patrons. Just make sure you don’t come across like that Florida mother and ask politely, preferably in letter form to the Adult Services Department Head, the Library Director, or even the Library Board of Trustees.
