The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Do You Have The Freedom To Read? - Encore

Episode Date: September 18, 2024

An encore of an important discussion with the CEO of the Halifax Public Libraries, Asa Kachan.

And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. You're just moments away from the latest episode of The Bridge and it's a Wednesday. That means it's an Encore Edition with a key question. Do you have the freedom to read? Now that's a pretty basic question, but it's being asked a lot these days. Do you have the freedom to read? That's our Encore Edition. It's from January of last year, 2023. Enjoy. And hello there, Peter Mansbridge in Stratford, Ontario.

Snowy weekend it was, but it was a pleasant one. I was down in London, Ontario last night for a speech at the Ivy Centre for Leadership, a nice little place tucked into the middle of a kind of a forest area in London, kind of the western, or sorry, eastern end of London. Pleasant evening, good crowd, good audience, good people. All right, we've got a number of things to talk about today, and it's highlighted in the headlines as we begin a new week. We're going to talk about the freedom to read.

But before I get there, just a little hint of what will come later in the program today. A kind of end bit that I'm looking forward to talking about. Do you check the expiry dates on everything? You know, when you go to the grocery store and you're going through all the different things on the shelves. Do you check, you know, like on your milk, on your eggs? On almost everything these days, there's an expiry date. And do you hold true to that? Once that passes the expiry date, do you toss it?

You know, I remember when I was a kid, before the days of expiry dates, you know, we were kids who were adventuresome, this little group of guys. And we used to venture away from our neighborhood and go into the bush. It wasn't far. I lived in the Glebe in Ottawa, and in those days, in the 60s, they were still building the Carleton campus, and there were parts of the area of that university today

that were just forest land. We used to go in there, and, you know, if we were really having a good day, we'd go in there and we'd take some food with us and we'd eat well one day one of the guys said why don't we store some food here so when we come back you know in a couple of weeks it'll be here and so that's what we did and we put a you know a tin of i think it was a tin of beans or something like that. And we kind of hid it near a tree trunk and all that. And then we forgot about it.

We forgot about it for more than a year, two years, I think. And then we thought, oh, go back. We've got to go back there and find those beans. And we went back, and sure enough, they were there, under a rock or wherever we'd go back. We got to go back there and find those beans. And we went back and sure enough, they were there under a rock or wherever we'd put them. We opened them up and we ate them. I can't remember whether we ate them cold or we somehow heated them up with a little fire, but nobody ever thought, Hey, you think these things are still okay? Well, they were. I mean, they were baked beans.

They had a certain effect, but it wasn't an effect that caused us to be sick. Let's just say that. But I always remembered that. Whenever I see expiry dates, I think, wham, I wonder whether they would have had an expiry date on those beans. Okay, so what am I talking about? I'm talking about expiry dates, and I'm talking about a piece that was in the New York Times the other day. On expiry dates and what you should actually believe about expiry dates. So we're going to talk about that later.

But first, we're going to talk about the freedom to read, which is an issue that comes up and has come up lately, and this focuses being on issues in the southern United States, about state governments that are saying, you know what, this book shouldn't be on the curriculum. Kids shouldn't be taught this or that. And when that happens, we sort of look at it from a distance and go, oh, man, I'm glad we live here and we don't live there. Well, is that the case?

Or are we at times under threat of losing the freedom to read what we wish to read or want to read? So given that and given our focus often on, you know, misinformation and critical thinking to a certain extent, I found out just last week that freedom to read week is next month, starting, you know, in a couple of days. It's actually near the end of February, but it's kind of freedom to read month, if you will. And it's to encourage Canadians to consider and reaffirm their commitment to intellectual freedom and resist emerging trends

to censor access to ideas and books and reading. So we thought, okay, who can I talk to about this issue and about Canada on this issue? And it didn't take long to realize that the best person to talk to was in Halifax at that wonderful, relatively new public library. And her name is Usa Katchen. She's the CEO and Chief Librarian at Halifax Public Libraries. She's also the current chair of the CULC, that's the Canadian Urban Library Council,

Canada's Association of Urban Library Leaders. And as her people say, she can speak to this issue, to the trend of the challenges that exist on intellectual freedom in North America and in Canada included in that. So I reached out and sure enough, Ussakachan was more than happy to have a chat. So let's get to it without Without further ado, here she is. One of the things that struck me immediately when I kind of read the website material on this,

on freedom to read, was this sentence. A couple of sentences, actually. Even in Canada, a free country by world standards, books and magazines are banned at the border. Schools and libraries are regularly asked to remove books and magazines from their shelves. Now, I think that'll surprise a lot of people that it's, you know, we hear these stories from different parts of the world, but it happens here too.

Talk about that a bit. Yeah, it does peter it's uh it is one of those things that we need to talk more about and not just during freedom to read week or month or it's an everyday um it's something we need to give care to every day so uh we are at the moment in North America seeing the rise in demands for censorship. Much of it is based in the southern United States, but that playbook is finding its way to Canada. Well, that's why I want to talk about that for a minute, because you're right. I mean, we see what's happening in the southern United States and the recent examples in Florida. But to hear that it happens here as well, I think is going to be a shock to some people.

So give me some examples or tell me about where and how it's happening here. Sure. Yeah, it's happening in Canada. There are school boards in Ontario that are reevaluating which books should be available to children. It is not unusual in Canadian libraries for us to have people contact us. And most recently, for example, demands to cancel drag queen story time have been quite common across this country. We had a youth drag show a few years ago at my library, and we received some quite significant threats. Now, when we traced back the IP addresses, we determined that that individual wouldn't make it by that evening, and the program went on.

And I remember feeling the weight of reading the terrible things that people will write when they ask you to remove an item from the library. And going to that program that evening and my heart filling with joy at this sort of peoplepoint of reading very, you know, untrue, very, very, it was just difficult to read and then and then being able to see the joy and be grateful for upholding that. But challenges to library materials come from all sides. So it's not a, regardless of where on the political spectrum, a challenge might originate. Fundamentally, what lies behind it is this fear. So this fear that, that if this particular item or this particular program goes ahead, that we, that, that bad things will happen. So it's a very paternalistic concept. So it would be, for example, if I were to say, Peter, I've read this book and I can process content in this. I can, I will disagree with that person.

I won't sort of, their point of view won't become my point of view. I can handle it, but other people aren't going to be able to. So I have to protect them from this content or this book or this idea. And Emily Knox, who does a lot of research, Dr. Emily Knox, who does quite a bit of research on this in the U.S., talks about this sort of mirror or people worry that the book will be a mirror. So somebody expresses a particular perspective on an issue. And the idea that that will be contagious is often what sits at the heart of it,

that that will mirror, that will reflect back on the reader. The reader will be, as a result of having read that item, will have a particular viewpoint or move toward a particular makes particular choices in their lives what's interesting is i have always viewed a book as a window not as a mirror so i i make a real point of reading disparate perspectives i want things i want to read if there's somebody i think i might disagree with i really want to read what they have to say because I can't formulate my argument against their perspective if I haven't read it and if I have not taken in that that content but censorship is generally about fear and about preventing others from having access to something what are the boundaries or should there be any boundaries I mean how do you decide or do you decide?

Well, you know what? This actually would not be good to have on the shelf. Well, people will often use phrases like dangerous and hateful. In Canada, we have a criminal code that determines hate speech. And as librarians, we are not the arbiters of hate speech. So we are people who create access. So generally speaking, if there is interest in the community, now every library that should, and all the ones that I know have,

very well-written collection development policies that are designed to protect from bias, that are designed to say, you know what, we need a broad representation of viewpoints on a topic. So there are many things in the library collection that I disagree with, but I can't presume the reason somebody would read that. And I can't presume what they will do with that content. So, you know, quite a sort of semi-neutral example I can give would be, you know, we have diet books in the library and some of them suggest, you know, removing quite nutritious food from

your diet for prolonged periods of time. Now, somebody may take that book out from the public library and make decisions on the food intake as a result of it that may have health consequences for them. But the person borrowing it from the library may actually be borrowing it to understand how they can support somebody who is on that diet and maybe understand more deeply the impact. So you can't make presumptions on what the intended use of that knowledge is on the part of people who borrow it. So it's closely tied to democratic freedom, that idea that we should be able to access ideas, we should be able to read and discern for ourselves what we want to do with that information. So does that mean that it basically goes unchecked, that any book can end up on the shelf? Well, we give thought to where books are shelved in the library.

Who's we? Well, collection development policies will often, if a book is, there are books that are more suited to young children, and there are books that are suited to young adults, and there are books that are suited to adult audiences. So that sort of sifting and sorting happens within the library. But generally speaking, if it is a topical book, if it's a book that people are talking about, if it is a topic that has some conflicting viewpoints within our community, those should be available to people at the public library. They should be able to read that book in order to say, well, I disagree with it. And here's how I'm going to take this argument apart. We do operate from a fundamental belief

that people should have equitable access to a wide range of resources. They should form their own opinions. They should be allowed to determine for themselves. And, you know, there's this concept that for every person there is a book and for every book there is a reader, right? So I even reflect on the types of books I've chosen at different times in my life and my interests, what am I drawn to and what am I less drawn to? I think back to the COVID-19 pandemic. I had been a reader of Nordic noir for years.

I went through a period of time where it felt like there was so much distress in the world. I didn't want to read something that might be gruesome where people would lose their lives. I was more drawn to how to bake sourdough bread. So I don't say that to at all minimize things, but I do, I do believe that, that, you know, people should have wide access and we should start with broad access. If the, if something is deemed to be hate speech by the courts who are the arbiters of hate speech, then, then that will not appear in the public library. But generally speaking, it's broader over narrower. And, you know, we only have to look back in history, Peter,

at the kinds of books that were banned over time. Looking back at the books that have been challenged at different times in history is really a glimpse into what people were anxious about at that time. You know, what were the things, what were the words that they were nervous to hear or didn't want that conversation to happen? And that, you know, that is quite interesting to me as a librarian to look at that history. I also look at the books that were banned when I was an emerging, you know, an emerging young adult. And, you know, I can remember reading Lives of Girls and Women, which I sort of took off my mother's bedside table. And, you know, so began my love affair with Alice Munro's writing

and Judy Blume's books, which were regularly banned at the time, were the ones that saw me through my adolescence. And, you know, Fahrenheit 451 and The Handmaid's Tale and books that are so important for us to read were all books that were deemed too dangerous at one time. So as libraries, you know, and as librarians, we work really hard to provide a broad access and we invite people to read and challenge. You know, Alvin Schrader, who was a professor at the library school at University of Alberta for many years, said, you know, the best safety net against bad ideas is better ideas, right? More debate, more intellectual freedom to oppose those bad ideas. To be free to argue against something

requires you to know what you're arguing against. And that is, you know, this freedom to read. I think occasionally freedom to read, people see freedom to read and social justice as coming against one another. I really believe we can't have social justice without freedom to read. In general ways, are governments a help or a hindrance towards freedom to read? That's a really interesting question.

And I guess I'm thinking mainly, you know, in Canada. Yeah, I would say in Canada, I think we have a good legal framework to stand our ground in upholding freedom to read. So I'm very grateful for that. You know, many of the efforts in the United States to limit freedom to read are originating government. They're highly politicized. And they not only are about removing books from shelves, but they're actually also often directed toward librarians and with threats of loss of employment and limitations to re-employment. And so very, very concerning, threatening strategies to sort of make people afraid to open that net wide and invite, you know, a wide range of viewpoints.

I have, you know, I've often said there should be something in every library that makes somebody angry at what they've read. That's, that's important. There are books in, in the library that I deeply, deeply personally disagree with. And, and many of the reasons we, we have good policies in place is to make sure that my bias doesn't determine what people in my community can read. I, there should be books there that make me angry and should be books there that make you angry. Do you, do you have people express that anger directly to you? Yes. And tell me about that. How does that work? Or do they pick up the phone and call you? Do they write letters? So they, do they arrive at the library and demand to see you and argue about a book or all of the above? and what I will often explain to them is this book that you disagree with,

talk about what about it is problematic. Talk to me about that, raise your concerns about that, but understand that if we open the door on censorship in our public libraries, it is, because that is particularly difficult when, when social justice or diversity, equity, and inclusion come up against things people have written. And my, my position on that is if we open the door to censorship, we only need to look at which books are most often censored. And at the moment, those are those are books like, you know, The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. They are Toni Morrison. They are books with LGBTQ plus characters, protagonists, anything that that might be about sexual health or sexual identity or gender identity. So we open the door on, you know, grab the book you want me to take out and I'll take it out. And I know that those voices that we have worked so hard to represent in our public libraries will be the ones that will be most negatively impacted and most likely to be censored.

So standing up sometimes feels difficult. It feels particularly difficult when the content of a book is something that I might personally find abhorrent. But it's important in all instances to say, you know, if the courts deem this hate, that's for the courts to decide. As a librarian, I need to trust in my public's ability to borrow a book that might be difficult and might be frustrating and hurtful, but trust that that can be the catalyst to more positive change, you know, the counterpoint to the viewpoint.

Are we at, and I ask this because you are going to devote this week in February or are thinking about this issue over the next month really, are we at a hinge point on this issue? Has enough happened in the last couple of years that you and your fellow librarians across the country are saying you know what we we need to really ensure that people understand you know the freedom to read oh i think we need to talk much more about it than we have i think um you know in this

country we have assumed that it's been well understood that people understand, you know, people, of course, believe that this is a fundamental right under the Charter, and that that is appropriate for us to uphold. I would say the challenges we've been receiving over the years, the last few years, tell us that actually it turns out that's not as well understood as we thought it was. And even inside our own organizations, there are people who hadn't really given it a lot of thought. And you'd couple that with this particular time in history, and I look forward to what social scientists will discover

through their research that's happened to us socially right now. Because I think there's a piece to this as well that is related to the polarization. So when we all needed to limit our social circles to 10 people, they tended to be 10 people who shared our common viewpoint on many things, may have had similar lived experiences, may have read the same publications,

and were quite aligned on issues. I think that, as well as search algorithms that feed back to us the things that we already believe to be true. I think those have created, those have been contributors to a polarization and othering of others. And this idea that I have to make sure that those people don't get this information or that distrust in one another and a,

and a bit of a fragility. And I don't want to say Canada's democracy is at risk at all, because that's too big a statement, but there's a fragility there to our belief in the capacity of others to, and, and our, and our willingness to engage with people who have different perspectives than our own. So it gets us much faster to this place of, well, that viewpoint is super dangerous because that's

different than what I think on this topic, as opposed to saying, I need to more deeply understand what arguments that person is making and, and, and speak up against them if need be, or become more empathetic based on what i read or you know i mean the outcome can be many different things but but it is that idea of of who is right and who is wrong that seems to have become more magnified um you know in in our country and in other places and i'm again i'm not the sociologist who's studying this, but I do feel there's a connection to the kind of isolation we've lived with over the last few years

and the way we consume information and certainly digital information and the ways in which that is fed to us. Because, you know, if I search something you know the publications and the articles that show up at the top of the list of things i might want to explore those are coming from places i'm already spending a bit of time in terms of which newspapers and magazines come my way. So I will not hear the counterpoint and it's easy then to presume I understand fully the topic and I, and I, everything else is dangerous. Rusa Kachin, it's, it's been a treat to talk to you. And this is really, it's really an important subject. And, you know, I hope it's got people.

I know listeners to this podcast, this show, will be talking about it. And I'm going to hear about it in the mail they write as well. And that's good because there's so much of what you're saying is, you know, we've all got to broaden our horizons a little bit, especially after these last couple of years where they've shrunk, you know, not, you know, in a way deliberately, but I don't think we've realized the impact that's had on us as citizens, you know? So this is a,

this is an opportunity to think about that and talk about it. So once again, thank you so much for this. You're welcome. You're welcome. Freedom to read is, and free expression. Think about that and talk about it. So once again, thank you so much for this. You're welcome. You're welcome. Freedom to read and free expression, that's how we're going to move forward to a more equitable world, I'm convinced. So we'll need to talk more.

And we will. Thanks again. Thank you. You know, one of the things I've always loved about this podcast is the ability for those who listen to admit through their letters to me. And sometimes when I bump into people in the streets or, you know, people at this event last night in London who said they're regular listeners of The Bridge. And that's great because this is a program that started from nothing. But one of the ideas behind it was to get people talking. You know, they don't have to talk to me.

Talk to their families. Talk to their friends. And every once in a while, I'll get a letter saying, you know, get an email that says, you know, I listen to the podcast when I'm out for my morning run. Or I listen to the podcast when I'm out for my morning run, or I listen to the podcast when I'm on my exercise bike, or I listen to the podcast with my family, with my spouse, or my kids, or my parents,

and we end up discussing. This is one of those days there's a real discussion point in that conversation with Usa Katchen from Halifax, from the public library in Halifax. She's the CEO. She's also the current chair of the Canadian Union of Library Councils, or Canadian Urban Library Council. And, you know, hopefully this conversation will get people talking in, you know, different living rooms and kitchens and wherever across the country.

So good for that. And thank you again to Saskatchewan for talking to us on this day. Okay, we're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, we're going to do that other issue, that end bit. And it's a classic end bit because it's about expiry dates, and what you should believe about them. You'll get a kick out of this. Back in a moment. And welcome back. You're listening to The Bridge on Sirius XM, channel 167. Canada Talks are on your favorite podcast platform. It's Monday.

Reminder that on both Wednesday and Friday, the program is also available on your YouTube channel. And we've got, you know, quite a few subscribers considering the program's already aired through a number of different formats before it's out there on the YouTube channel. But, you know, I can't remember what the latest subscriber list is. I think it's more than 1,000. And that's great. Good for them. They get a kick out of watching us put it together. It's not exactly a major television production, but it is kind of funny to watch it.

Lots of comments last week on me wearing a toque for the show. They wanted to know whether you get heat here in Stratford. All right. The New York Times ran this piece last week. It's by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt. And it's another great little talker. It's about this issue of expiry dates and what you should actually believe and whether they really reflect when whatever that product is,

is kaput, is ready for the can. So I'm not going to read it all, but I'm going to read some of the segments because I think it's fascinating. So reading from the piece. Let's start with the things you definitely don't have to worry about, no matter what expiry date say. You don't have to worry about vinegar, honey, vanilla, or other extracts. Sugar, salt, corn syrup, and molasses will last virtually forever. That's what it says,

virtually forever, with little change in quality. Regular steel cutter rolled oats will last for a year or so before they start to go rancid, but par-cooked oats or instant oats can last nearly forever. Flour. White flour is almost certainly fine to use no matter its age. Whole wheat and other whole grain flours can acquire a metallic or soapy odor within a few months. This whiter equals longer rule of thumb is true for non-ground grains as well. Refined white rice, for example, will last for years, while brown rice will last only for months. This is because unrefined grains contain fats, and fats are the first thing to go off when it comes to dry pantry staples.

Tree nuts, typically high in fat, will go rancid within a few months in the pantry. Store them in the freezer to extend that to a few years. Taking notes here. Bread. I freak out about bread, like I really worry all the time about bread shelf stable supermarket breads made with oils and preservatives can stay soft for weeks in the fridge but the lean crusty sourdough from the corner bakery will be stale by the next day i'll probably start to mold before the week is up. You know, I always check the bread, no matter how new it is.

I always kind of take a hard look at it before I toast it to make sure there's no mold on it anywhere. Nothing worse than looking at a piece of bread with some mold in it. Beans. Dried beans and lentils will remain safe to eat for years after purchase, but they'll become tougher and take longer to cook as time goes by. If you aren't sure how old your dried beans are, avoid using them in recipes that include acidic ingredients like molasses or tomatoes. Acid can drastically increase the length of time it takes beans to soften. Spices.

We all make fun of our parents for using spices that expired in the 1980s. It's true, right? You see a spice rack and you go, yeah, how long has that been there? Looks good. Spice rack. Looks good. Real 1980s thing. But how long has that been there? Looks good. Spice rack. Looks good. Real 1980s thing. But how long, really?

Well, we may make fun of them, but other than losing potency, there's nothing criminal in using them, unless you consider flavorless chicken paprikash a crime. What about canned and jarred goods? As a rule, metal lasts longer than glass. Glass lasts longer than plastic. So long as there's no outward sign of spoilage, such as bulging or rust.

That takes me back to the story of the beans we stored in the bush out near Carlton as a kid. So long as there's no outward sign of spoilage or visible spoilage when you open it, such as cloudiness, moldiness, or rotten smells, your canned fruits, vegetables, and meats will remain as delicious and palatable as the day you bought them for years. Bracket. Or in the case of, say, Vienna sausages,

at least as good as they were to begin with. Oh, dear. Condiments. Mustard lasts forever. Mustard lasts forever. Ketchup will start to turn color before the year is out, but will still remain palatable. Contrary to popular belief,

mayonnaise has an exceptionally long shelf life, especially when it doesn't contain ingredients like fresh lemon juice or garlic. High concentrations of fat, salt, and acid are all enemies of bacteria and mold. Eggs. Okay, here we go. I love eggs. My wife says I eat too many eggs. I love eggs, especially on the weekend. Eggs. We all know what a rotten egg smells like, right? Why else would it be a benchmark for describing so many other bad smells. But really, how many times have you actually smelled a rotten egg? Once? Twice? Never? Probably never, at least according to the impromptu poll that the New York Times conducted on Twitter.

That's because it takes a long time for eggs to go bad. How long? The Julian date printed on each carton, that's the three-digit number, maybe this is just in the States, they print it this way. I mean, I know there's a printing on the Canadian ones, but nevertheless, in the States, the Julian date printed on each carton, that's the three-digit number ranging from 001 for January 1st to 365 for December 31st. Represents the date the eggs were packed, which in most parts of the country can be up to 30 days after the egg was actually laid. The sell-by stamp can be another 30 days after the pack date. That's 60 full days. But odds are good that they'll still be palatable for several weeks longer than that.

Sure. Milk. You know, I've told this story before, but when I lived in Churchill, Manitoba, back in the 1960s, milk came in on the train, and it usually arrived in Churchill 24 hours before it was going to go sour.

That's how long it took them to get the milk up to Churchill. And so what you do is you buy a whole bunch of the milk when it arrived in the in the dodson bay company and you take it home and you'd freeze it when you freeze milk it kind of goes like yellow but you take it out you take out it would come in bags right and you take those kind of one quarter one liter whatever they were, bags. You'd take one out of the freezer each night and let it thaw out overnight, and it was fine for a day.

Anyway, the New York Times does not include a special section on 1960s Churchill. It goes right to the point here. We've all accidentally poured some clumpy, spoiled milk into our cereal bowls. Yeah, it's nothing worse than that. It seems as if our milk is perfectly fine until it's suddenly not. How does it go bad overnight? The truth is, it doesn't. From the moment you open a carton of milk,

bacteria start to digest lactose, milk sugars, and produce acidic byproducts. Once its pH hits 4.6, that's when casein clumps, milk protein. Want longer-lasting milk? Look for ultra-high temperature, or UHT on the label. Milk in these gardens has been pasteurized at high temperatures, 275 degrees Fahrenheit, hot enough to destroy not only viruses and bacteria, but bacterial spores as well. Most organic milk brands undergo UHT. Bonus, in the blind taste tests I've conducted, most people preferred the sweeter flavor of UHT milk.

I don't know, do they do that in Canada? I'll have to have a look. I don't know about that. Now, the last point is the most important point because this is where you got to get serious. Baby food. The only food with federally mandated use by dating. This is in the States.

That expiration date represents the latest date that the manufacturer can guarantee that the food contains not less of each nutrient than what is printed on the label. Or in the case of formula, that it can still pass through an ordinary rubber nipple. Rest assured that if there's a zombie apocalypse, you'll still be able to eat that baby food

and gain some nutritional benefit. Well, did you learn anything there? I did. I learned that mustard lasts forever. The problem with mustard, come to think of it, is not that it doesn't last forever, but that it kind of gets crusty and moldy around the top. It looks really bad. It looks like, oh, this can't be good anymore. Toss it and get a new one.

When here, according to the New York Times, it lasts forever. So I'll have to remember that. Well, I hope you enjoyed that encore edition of The Bridge from January of 2023. And the topic, do you have the freedom to read? A reminder that tomorrow it's your turn. And the question is very much what's on your mind? Could be anything.

You still have time to write, but you've got to get your responses in before 6 p.m. Eastern time tonight. All right? So that's the Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com, the Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. The question for you is, what's on your mind this week? Could be anything. Could be politics. Could be about reading.

It could be anything. Send it in. Keep it short, don't want essays, keep it short, paragraph at the most. Include your name and the location you're writing from. I'm Peter Mansbridge, thanks for joining us on this Encore Edition. Thank you.