Stuff You Should Know - SYSK Selects: How Book Banning Works

Episode Date: October 24, 2020

If you want to control the masses, control what they read. After all, books are seeds that germinate new points of view. As a result, the struggle against banning books is contentious and continual. Learn more about banning books in this classic episode. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On the podcast, Hey Dude, the 90s called, David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're gonna use Hey Dude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s.

We lived it, and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass

and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help. And a different hot, sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life. Tell everybody, ya everybody, about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never, ever have to say. Bye, bye, bye.

Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Hey everybody, it's me, Josh, and for this week's S-Y-S-K Selects, I've chosen How Book Banding Works, which is an episode we released all the way back in 2012. But it's as pertinent today, sadly, as it was back then.

I hope you feel inspired to go out and read a book that somebody didn't want you to read, because you can. Enjoy. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me is Charles W. Chuck Bryant,

and this is Stuff You Should Know. Do, do, do, do, do, do, do. Just did my little best Anchorman move. Yeah. Getting the papers all in order. Reading the prompter, why wouldn't that be great? I don't feel so funny these days, man. Well, we need to get the teleprompter writer

to juice up your jokes. I agree. Everyone knows that, right? We don't actually make any of this stuff up. We have somebody write the show and we read it. This is a very, very well rehearsed, practiced, labored podcast. That's right.

I think this is the second of two good topics today. Yeah. Part one, asexuality. Part two, banning books. Yeah. What do they have to do with each other? Nothing. I thought I saw a common thread and now that I've looked,

I've forgotten it, but there is something. Discrimination, maybe. I guess so. Maybe. We'll find out. It'll pop up possibly. It'll be like the Pee Wee's secret word of the day. Oh, yeah.

Isn't that what it was called? I think so. Man, that guy was cool. So you got an intro proper for this or? Chuck. Yes. Are you familiar with the last week of September? I am.

You are. You've gone through it before? Yeah. It's after the third week and before the first week of October. That's exactly right. Yes. It just so happens that that very week is Band Book Week. Did not know that existed.

Well, it does. Till today. It does. Yeah. You haven't heard of Band Book Week before? No. I have. I've seen the subversive displays outside of B. Dalton

Booksellers and basically the whole point of it is it's like, hey, people have tried to ban these books. So make sure you read these because it means that there's somebody out there who doesn't want you to. That's right. Hey, look what I've got. I've got to kill a mockingbird over here. Yeah, that's a big one.

Tempted? Yeah. Yeah. So the whole point of Band Book Week is to celebrate intellectual freedom. That's right. Because there are people out there who would take that away from you if they could.

We know it. You go back and listen to some of our podcasts. There's certain words that were beeped out because the man has us under his thumb. Thanks, Gibby. Yeah. So I would strongly recommend it's coming up. By the time this thing gets released, we'll be in September.

That's right. We should probably post something about Band Book Week when it comes, OK? Yeah, September 30 through October 6, actually. So it's really the first week in October this year. Oh, it's weird that they would put it in the last week of October. The first week of October, yeah.

Or last week of September. Yeah. Yeah. That was confusing for a second. Let's talk band books, man. More than 11,000 books have been challenged since 1982, Josh. That's just since 82. They've been, I was reading about The Catcher in the Rye.

It came out in, wow, man, I wish I knew. It came out in either the late 50s or the early 60s. The late 50s were 1960. Because in 1960, a teacher who assigned it to his class for reading got fired. Really? Yeah. It's one of my favorite books.

Is it? Yeah, and it's one that I've reread several times over the years, and it always takes on a little different meaning depending on my age, which is interesting, yeah. Have you read The Catcher's Companion? No, we got that as a gift, right? No, I haven't read it yet. It's just like footnotes and extrapolations

and explanations, like this guy went into the world of Catcher in the Rye and made footnotes of the whole thing. I definitely need to check that out. It's actually thicker than The Catcher in the Rye. 1951, by the way. OK, so 1951, within nine years, somebody lost their job because they assigned that book to read.

Wow. That's pretty common. Usually with book banning, it comes out of the public school system. Yeah, and less so libraries, though, right? Well, it's usually school libraries. No, less so public libraries. Public libraries, yeah.

So if you go on the internet and you look for banned books, you're going to find a lot of confusion. There's this body called the American Library Association. And a lot of people think that they're in charge of banning books. It's absolutely the opposite of the truth. The American Library Association is basically the librarian's lobby.

And they are committed to no censorship whatsoever. Yeah, ask any librarian. And they're going to probably be in favor of not banning books. Right. As a matter of fact, the ALA maintains a library bill of rights. And in this library bill of rights is a provision for the free access

to libraries for minors, which basically says this. We have a bunch of books that we're not going to make any judgments on. We have a book that you don't want your kid to read. It's your job as their parent to monitor what they read. And you can decide what they read or not. But that's it. Your opinion doesn't extend to anyone else's kids.

So that means that if you want to ban a book, we're going to tell you no, because you're responsible for your child, but not everybody else's child too, which means, in short, that the ALA doesn't censor books. This is a big deal, because this happens a lot. There's 11,000 challenges, you said, since 1982. Since 1982, and I think there were, in 2011, there were 326 challenges last year.

A few of these are The Color of Earth series by Kim Dong Hoa and The Reasons Why, nudity, sex education, The Hunger Games Trilogy. My mom's having a baby, a kid's month-by-month guide to pregnancy, but we certainly don't want our kids to learn anything about that. No, especially not with mom. Brave New World by Huxley in sensitivity, nudity, racism.

Tequila Mockingbird, like we mentioned, Harper Lee's classic because of offensive language and racism. And those are just a few of the nine, I'm sorry, 10 most-challenged books of last year. Right. You'll also find in just about every list the most-challenged series since 2000 is the Harry Potter books.

This is Satan. 3,000 challenges, and that was from up to, I believe, like 2008 or 2009. Maybe no, of 2010, from 2000 to 2010, they received 3,000 challenges. And it was because it had satanic overtones or undertones, one of the two. That's how.

Or midtones. People challenging it felt at least. So for the most part, when you see a book being challenged or banned, it's because people are concerned about its influence on children. But as you've seen, the American Library Association says, hey, man, kids, there should be free access to information for kids.

Yeah, Judy Blooms Forever is one that's always on the list, too, for that reason, because it deals with a young girl's burgeoning sexuality and the confusion and the awkwardness and the thrill that comes along with that. And that one isn't. That was a great description. Was it?

Yeah, from a 41-year-old man with a beard. Well, dude, that was 14 once. Girls and boys are all like, you know, we're all scared and awkward and thrilled. So how do you do this, man? How do you issue a formal challenge to a book? And what does that consist of? What does it mean?

It means that you have gone to a library, a single library, and said, I want to challenge this book. And the librarian decides whether or not to ban it. So it's as simple as that. That's how book banning works. And you don't even have to use such lofty language. Like, I want to issue a challenge. You can just say, like, this book

needs to be taken out of this library. This book is filth. This book is pervasively vulgar. That's a big one. And the librarian, at that moment, decides whether a book gets banned or not. And for the most part, they err on the side of not banning them. But when they say, OK, let's take that book out,

that book has just been banned. So it doesn't mean that a book has been banned. It doesn't mean it's been banned across the country, although some countries have banned books in its entirety, like the country's entirety. But in the US and in the modern world, it usually means that somewhere in the United States, there's a group of people, whether it's

kids in a school district or kids, people who are served by a public library, who don't have access to a certain book, because one person found it offensive and convinced the librarian to make the decision for everybody else based on that person's objections. That's a banned book. Yeah, person or persons.

A lot of times, it's a group. We'll get together with a list, even. And they'll rally the troops and say, come on out from your homes and let's get together and submit a list. And the librarians, like you said, most times, will say no, because they generally have the courts on their side if it gets to that point. For the most part, the courts like

to defend the right, the First Amendment. But I mean, think about that pressure, especially if you are a school librarian and the school board is telling you, hey, don't forget, we employ you. And we're telling you, remove this book. And the librarian's like, no. T.S. That's against the First Amendment. Yeah.

So should we talk about some of the laws? I think we should. Let's talk about, do you want to talk about the history of it? Yeah. Who wrote this one? I think this was Conger, too. I don't think so. Oh, no?

Yeah, it was a freelancer. Oh, OK. Basically, since the days of Socrates, they've been trying to ban teachings of some sort at the other. He was heavily scrutinized. And back then, if you wanted to ban something, you just burned the few copies of it that existed.

Right. And so he was made to drink hemlock for what he taught. But yeah, if there's two copies of a book in existence and you get both copies and you set them on fire. Done. Problem solved. Consider it banned. And then what happened?

What came along? Well, the printing press. And all of a sudden, you had to officially try and ban a book because there were too many to gather up and burn. And you remember the star chamber starring Michael Douglas? Did you ever watch that? No. They were the real star chamber.

Did you? There was a real. Yeah. OK. So the real star chamber that was, I think, created in Stuart, England. Stuart era England. Man, I probably shouldn't even say that because I'm not sure.

Oh, really? In England in the 17th century, there was a group of judges that were in charge of like, they were like the elite judges. They were the censor board, basically, was one of their roles. And then Henry VIII came along and got rid of them. But he started his own kind of censorship

with licensing laws that basically said that the state had the opportunity to censor things before they were even published. So that was one of the earliest forms of straight up book banning or book censorship. Good point. It happened a long time ago. Yeah.

Yours? Sure. 1982, Board of Education, Island Trees School District, VPCO. Yeah. That's a mouthful. They said, basically, that you couldn't remove library material just because a school official doesn't agree with the ideas.

They said that the books on their list were, quote, just plain filthy, so they wanted them removed. Yeah. Some people said, no, we're going to sue you for that. Well, the Supreme Court said so. Basically, it has to be pervasively vulgar, I guess, is why they use those words. Yeah.

That's what they can actually ban a book if who finds it that? I think society, basically. Oh, that's easy to figure out. Well, for the most part, as far as books go for banning a book, really tough to do. Once it reaches the Supreme Court, they're going to be like, no, it's a book. Put it back.

It's obscenity that's not protected at all. Right. Well, because the kicker there is the number three rule that they decided should be used to determine if something is, I guess, filthy, was it could contain no literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. And that's the one where you can pretty much, say, claim any book has value like that.

That's how we have hardcore pornography still, I'm sorry. So you can say this is art. That's true. Letting things with junk and chug. Shocking all the way. Stop you should know. On the podcast, Hey Dude, the 90s called David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude,

bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're going to use Hey Dude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s. We lived it, and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. It's a podcast packed with interviews, co-stars,

friends, and nonstop references to the best decade ever. Do you remember going to Blockbuster? Do you remember Nintendo 64? Do you remember getting Frosted Tips? Was that a cereal? No, it was hair. Do you remember AOL Instant Messenger and the dial-up sound like poltergeist?

So leave a code on your best friend's beeper, because you'll want to be there when the nostalgia starts flowing. Each episode will rival the feeling of taking out the cartridge from your Game Boy, blowing on it, and popping it back in, as we take you back to the 90s. Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeart radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. The hardest thing can be knowing who to turn to when questions arise or times get tough, or you're at the end of the road. OK, I see what you're doing. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass

and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place, because I'm here to help. This, I promise you. Oh, god. Seriously, I swear. And you won't have to send an SOS, because I'll be there for you.

Oh, man. And so will my husband, Michael. Um, hey, that's me. Yeah, we know that, Michael. And a different hot, sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life, step by step. Oh, not another one. Kids, relationships, life in general, can get messy.

You may be thinking, this is the story of my life. Just stop now. If so, tell everybody, yeah, everybody, about my new podcast, and make sure to listen, so we'll never, ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts. So that case, that 1982 Island Trees case, or Pico case,

I don't know what they call it. That was a really big deal, because it took place in a school library. And it basically, the Supreme Court said, school libraries are special places. Schools are places of inquiry. And so their repository of knowledge, meaning their library, has special protection.

Like, we understand that you're worried about the children's minds being corrupted, but you don't get to decide that. Like, this is information that's out there. And as long as it's basically not like hardcore pornography, child pornography, obscenity, like, it should, it has every right to be in there under the First Amendment. Amen.

It was a big deal. It was a big deal. So as 1988, I remember this one, because I was on a newspaper staff at the time. Oh, yeah. And I got interviewed for the news. Oh, yeah? Yeah, like the local news came out.

Hazelwood School District v. Kulmaya, that was very famously when high school newspapers basically were said to not have the same rights as if you were an adult running a newspaper. And it was not a form of public expression. So schools could, in the end, kind of censor what was going in these things. At least in school curriculum.

Oh, I thought it was in the paper. In the paper, too. I'm sorry. I thought you meant in these things, meaning libraries. Yeah. No, no, in the school papers, for sure. But it was extended into classroom curriculum, too, like that.

Which was a big deal. Yeah, did you read that article about Texas? Yeah, let's get to that. You want to? Yeah. OK, so Texas has this very controversial textbook review committee that wields a lot of power, because Texas is the biggest textbook buyer in the country.

And so if you're a textbook manufacturer, and one state is ordering most of your textbooks, you're just going to print one and send it to everybody. Yeah, it's basically Texas and California are the two states that wield the most power, because they spend the most dough, because they have the most school-aged kids, basically. Right, exactly.

So they basically say what Texas decides goes in their textbooks, goes in the textbooks for a lot of other states, as well, not just Texas, right? Yeah, I looked at the expense of a textbook. And I think one of the manufacturers said something like several million dollars can go into a major biology textbook, because of the illustrations and everything that goes into it.

And they're like, we can't make one of these for Texas and one for other states. It's just everyone's going to get Texas's version of the truth. Exactly, so Texas has this committee that is largely conservative that starting in, I think, 2009 basically held hearings on revisions that they wanted to see done to social studies curriculum. These are elected people, too, by the way, which is important,

because apparently a lot of them can buy their way right on that list. OK, so social studies, you've got history, sociology, economics, and a lot of the stuff that they were adding in there were, I guess, kind of slanted everything a little more toward the idea that the founders of the United States were Christian, that one of the things they wanted to get in there

was not just Martin Luther King's nonviolent civil rights protests, but the Black Panthers' violent civil rights protests were another one. And if you're a conservative, you're like, well, OK, I agree with a lot of what these people are saying. The problem is what they were saying was that there's a liberal slant to academia and that they were taking it upon themselves

to correct that by putting a conservative slant. Yeah, one of the other amendments was to cut Thomas Jefferson from a list of figures who inspired revolutions of the late 18th century and 19th century, and they said, let's replace them with Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin instead. Another one, in economics. They wanted to add Milton Friedman and Friedrich von

Hayek, champions of the free market economic theory to the list of economist studies. We talked about Milton Friedman in one where basically he used Chile as a laboratory for Reaganomics before Reagan was president, to trickle down economics. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember that. And then one of the ones that was shot down by a Democrat, Mavis Knight wanted to introduce an amendment requiring

students study the reasons for the founding fathers protecting religious freedom by not saying one religion is good above all else, and that was actually struck down. They said, you can't put that in this book. Right, she was a Democrat who introduced it. Yeah, it was sure. The conservative said, no. Well, they'd basically vote along party lines,

so the vote was 10 to four or whatever it is. So it was a big deal. 10 to five. Like it had, it was one of those things that kind of went underreported and underestimated, but there's a really good documentary out there that came out in, I think, 2009 maybe? 2010, yeah.

The revisionaries? Yeah. And I think it's up on Netflix streaming right now. It is, Scott Thurman. And I saw it was a trailer, but it looked pretty good. And it was a big deal. It's not just like, oh, some people in Texas want to change some textbooks.

It has national implications. Right, it's an info war, basically. And that's what book banning is based on in a lot of ways as well. It's like, if you can remove a different viewpoint, especially when it's being presented to kids, then you can keep that viewpoint from germinating in their emerging mind or worldview.

Absolutely. And so books like Daddy's New Roommate gets banned. Yeah, about a boy whose dad has a new boyfriend now. He's a divorced dad and his new roommate moves in as gay. And Sarah Palin herself asked for that to be removed from the library when she was the mayor of Wasilla, Alaska. Oh yeah, I remember that. And that guy came out and said, that woman is my mortal enemy.

Really, that was his response. And thanks for the press is what he should have said, too. Yeah, I guess so. In the meantime, in Texas, Mary Helen Berlanga has tried repeatedly to get Latino figures included in textbooks as role models for the large Hispanic population in Texas. And she's been repeatedly denied to the point

where, in 2010, she stopped out of a meeting saying, they can't just pretend this is white America and that we don't exist. These aren't experts. These aren't historians. They're just rewriting history. So pretty hard words. Yeah.

Hey, dude, the 90s called David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're going to use Hey Dude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s. We lived it, and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it.

It's a podcast packed with interviews, co-stars, friends, and nonstop references to the best decade ever. Do you remember going to Blockbuster? Do you remember Nintendo 64? Do you remember getting Frosted Tips? Was that a cereal? No, it was hair. Do you remember AOL Instant Messenger and the dial-up

sound like poltergeist? So leave a code on your best friend's beeper, because you'll want to be there when the nostalgia starts flowing. Each episode will rival the feeling of taking out the cartridge from your Game Boy, blowing on it and popping it back in, as we take you back to the 90s.

Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. The hardest thing can be knowing who to turn to when questions arise or times get tough, or you're at the end of the road. Ah, OK, I see what you're doing.

Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place, because I'm here to help. This, I promise you. Oh, god. Seriously, I swear. And you won't have to send an SOS,

because I'll be there for you. Oh, man. And so will my husband, Michael. Um, hey, that's me. Yep, we know that, Michael. And a different hot, sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life, step by step. Oh, not another one.

Kids, relationships, life in general, can get messy. You may be thinking, this is the story of my life. Oh, just stop now. If so, tell everybody, yeah, everybody, about my new podcast, and make sure to listen, so we'll never, ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

I'm Mangesh Atikular. And to be honest, I don't believe in astrology. But from the moment I was born, it's been a part of my life. In India, it's like smoking. You might not smoke, but you're going to get secondhand astrology. And lately, I've been wondering if the universe has

been trying to tell me to stop running and pay attention. Because maybe there is magic in the stars, if you're willing to look for it. So I rounded up some friends and we dove in, and let me tell you, it got weird fast. Tantric curses, Major League Baseball teams, canceled marriages, K-pop. But just when I thought I had to handle on this sweet and

curious show about astrology, my whole world came crashing down. Situation doesn't look good. There is risk to father. And my whole view on astrology, it changed. Whether you're a skeptic or a believer, I think your ideas are going to change, too. Listen to Skyline Drive and the iHeart radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You want to hear some other challenged authors? Let's, man. Because there's challenges all over the place, apparently. Judy Bloom, of course. Robert Cormier, or Cormier. Did you ever read I Am the Cheese when you were growing up?

Nope. Or The Chocolate War? I think I read that one. Great books, banned, many times. J.K. Rowling, she is, like I said, she is, I guess, of the devil, because a lot of people have a problem with the Harry Potter books. Katherine Patterson, Bridge to Terabithia.

Stephen King, Maya Angelou, can't have any of that. Yeah, the Alabama State Textbook Committee said that, I know why the cage bird sings, encourages bitterness toward white people. R.L. Stein, who is sort of like a Stephen King for kids. Yeah, goosebumps. Yeah, and I think I actually worked on one of his little TV shows, The Nightmare Room.

Oh, yeah? Was it Nightmare Room? I think so. Yeah, back in the day. And John Steinbeck, of course. Yeah, in 1989, of mice and men was banned in Chattanooga, because Steinbeck was well-known for his anti-business attitude.

And then Alvin Schwartz was number one, and he wrote one of my favorite sets of books, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series. Oh, really? I never heard of this. Oh, man, they were scary with the most ghastly illustrations you've ever seen. They're awesome.

And are those banned just because they're scary and ghoulish? I guess so. No, it's probably satanic, too. Gotcha. So we were talking about how, if a book is challenged, it's probably, if it gets to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court is probably going to rule in favor of the librarian who said no.

But that's not the case with obscenity, like obscene literature. Like, it is specifically excluded in US case law from First Amendment protection. And that's kind of emerged over the years, starting in 1873 with the Comstock laws. It basically said you can't sell obscene literature in interstate commerce.

And then people were like, OK, well, then we won't, or don't enforce it or whatever. And it just kind of went enforced or unchallenged for like three quarters of a century. And then in the 50s, you had Roth versus the United States where all of a sudden we're like, wait, we need to start explaining what obscenity is, because you can't just say it's just whatever.

That's what they started as, though. Like in the 50s, they basically said obscenity, pornography basically is what that means, is utterly without social value. That was a big quote. So that basically was a mark against anybody who's pro obscenity, right? And then in the 70s, there was one called Miller versus California.

And this guy basically sent out a mass mailer chuck of an advertisement for his adult magazines. So everybody got them. Old people, kids, housewives, businessmen, everybody went to their mail that day, opened it up. And there was basically obscene advertising. And so California arrested the guy and it went to trial. And the Supreme Court said, OK, yes, obscenity is not

protected, but we need to say what obscenity is. And they came up with this three point test called the Miller test, which is that one prong you were talking about earlier. Yeah, the third one is no artistic merit, basically. Literary, political, or scientific value, which is probably the terms that they nailed this guy for. Yeah.

If it was just a flyer of pornographic ads, he couldn't really say, no, this is literature. Right, like check these out. The other two involve patently offensive sexual conducts or appeal to a prurient interest when taken as a whole. There it is. That's what connected asexuality, prurient. Was that it?

Yeah. But the big point with those, Chuck, is that the prurient interest is local. So basically, if everybody in your town would be offended by this, then that's the local judgment that's for that standard. But then the scientific, artistic, literary standard is national.

Right. So if your town thinks it's science, but your town doesn't know what it's talking about, that's not a standard. Right, right. So that's obscenity. That's obscenity. But the good thing is, if you are trying to ban something

as obscene, the burden of proof is on you to prove this thing passes all three points of the Miller test. That is true, and that's a tough burden to get passed in a court. It is tough. I'm surprised that more book banning fans aren't trying to infiltrate the library community. You know what I'm saying?

I think they do constantly. Oh, you mean become librarians? Yeah, I don't know. I mean, if that's where the power is. I think the librarians, really, the library industry, it's very powerful. And if they find out that you're a wolf in sheep's clothing, they'll kill you.

Boy, have you ever talked to librarians? Chris Paulette here is a librarian. They're really passionate people. It's almost like a public service in a way, because I'm sure they don't make a lot of dough, and they just all really believe in knowledge and protecting access to it. Yeah, it's pretty cool.

Go librarians. Yeah, go give your local librarian a pat on the back today. Yeah, give them a hug. Ask them first, and then give them a hug. And if they say no, don't give them a hug. Just shake their hand and politely nod. Maybe a curtsy. And that's great, Chuck.

I like the curtsy. All right, well, if you want to learn more about band books, we suggest you go to the ALA site. I believe ALA.com. And then you can also write in band books in the search bar at HowStuffWorks.com. And it's going to bring up this really great article. Finally, it's time for Listener Mail.

Josh, I'm going to call this disco fever from Diane in Kentucky. Hey, guys, your disco episode brought back fond memories for me. In the summer of 1978, I was in my early 20s. And I've just made it from the sticks to the big city, New York City. It's a big city.

I had very little money. The city's infrastructure was crumbling. And this is kind of what we pointed out, the bad economy. And it was separated from my boyfriend by a continent, a bigger obstacle in those days before cell phones in the internet and reasonable airfares. Like, that was back when a long distance relationship was serious.

Remember those days, like, is it long distance? Don't talk too long. It's long distance. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. Now it's like, what? Yeah, I forgot about that. Or 10, 10, to 20 or whatever. Like certain times of day were cheaper or something?

No, there's like a number you could dial. Oh, yeah, yeah. Like real cheap long distance. Yeah, I remember that. 10, 10, to 20, I think is what it was. I was questioning the decisions I had made in my life and it was pretty much a struggle for me. But I had disco.

I would go with a guy friend to a place on 3rd Avenue that was more or less the equivalent of an Applebee's with disco music and a dance floor, complete with disco ball. It certainly wasn't what you would call a disco tech or a cool place by any stretch of the imagination. But she was broke and we could order the cheapest thing on the menu and spend the whole night dancing.

I was completely oblivious to any social or cultural implications of the music. But just knew that it was cheap entertainment and so much fun. Yes, the lyrics were silly and the beat was rather unimaginative, but coming off the era of Vietnam Watergate and a plethora of social upheavals,

that was the great part of the appeal. Dancing to disco and laughing at the lyrics was play. It was easy to learn the moves and much for her, not for me. And much more fun than the mindless dancing, which attended rock music, which I like to listen to, but let's face it, dancing to rock music, it's pretty boring, pretty fast. I don't know if I thought it was the best disco song,

but one of the most fun and exhilarating and anely silly for me was Donna Summers MacArthur Park. Still brings a smile to my face just thinking about it. I didn't know Donna Summers did MacArthur Park. I gotta listen to that. And that was Diane Raleigh in Louisville, Kentucky. So glad we could bring back some good memories there for you.

Yeah, thanks a lot Diane, it's awesome. And we heard from a lot of people who were like, guys, you're saying that if I hate discos because I'm homophobic, don't be stupid. No, we didn't say that specifically. We said, if you hate disco outright with a burning passion, but for no real reason, but you can't really tell why it's getting to you like this,

maybe it's time to step back and examine it. We also said that there's plenty of room for people who just don't like disco, just don't like the music. And it doesn't mean you're homophobic. So, lighten up and listen more clearly. If you want to get in touch with me and Chuck, you can tweet to us. You can tweet.

To SYSK podcast, you can also join us on facebook.com slash stuff you should know. You can also read us the riot act via email. To stuffpodcastandhowstuffworks.com. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio's How Stuff Works. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app.

Apple podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows. On the podcast, Hey Dude, the 90s called, David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're gonna use Hey Dude as our jumping off point,

but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s. We lived it, and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast,

Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help. And a different hot, sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life. Tell everybody, ya everybody,

about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never, ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts.