Bomb Threats at Libraries Are Becoming All Too Common

Every time a library has to close, the free flow of information and ideas is cut off and we all suffer for it. And we’re seeing this happen in real-time, as reports of bomb threats against libraries have spiked over the last year. At least 10 different public library systems were forced to shut down in the last month alone as a result of bomb threats, including Iowa City, Sharon Forks in Georgia, multiple libraries in the Chicagoland area, and three separate bomb threats at a library in Davis, California! It’s a horrifying new development ushered in by right-wing extremists, Republican politicians, and various hate groups.

And it’s unfortunately not isolated to recent news. Last September, Motherboard reported a wave of 12 violent threats at libraries across the country. Here at The Mary Sue, we’ve covered the battles libraries have faced in the form of book bans, budget cuts, and even the dissolving of some libraries entirely. And the threat against libraries and librarians is beginning to mimic the threats against hospitals and doctors providing gender-affirming care. Both these disturbing developments are due to targeting by right-wing anti-LGBTQ fearmongering groups spreading misinformation online and inciting violence. In a recent post to her Substack, Daily Beast contributor Kelly Weill estimated that at least 47 violent threats over the past year have created disruptions at schools, libraries, and public events.

It’s important to understand that every time a bomb threat is made to a public library, credible or otherwise, it forces that whole system of libraries to shut down until they can be reopened safely again. In the case of an undisclosed threat to the Denver Public Library last September, every location across the city was forced to close. Libraries across all of Hawaii closed that same month in response to an “unspecified threat”, leaving all of those resources inaccessible to the entire state that day. This doesn’t even begin to address the ways that schools and their libraries are targeted with bomb threats, as was the case for an elementary school in Tulsa, Oklahoma that received two separate threats just a few weeks ago.

Bomb threats can be really traumatizing for libraries and librarians, actually

The consistent nature of bomb threats against libraries also has a deep impact on the library workers themselves. It’s bad enough that librarians are at the forefront of a culture war and have to deal with crises like white nationalists storming events and state governments claiming that freely accessible books are too radical. Now, library workers also have to fear for their lives every time someone threatens to bomb their workplace. These public library workers are dealing with a near-systemic level of violence against themselves and their livelihoods.

This kind of systemic violence is backed up by a 2022 study from Urban Librarians Unite (in partnership with the New York Library Association and St. John’s University) with the aptly morbid title, 2022 Urban Library Trauma Study. Comprising a literature review, survey, focus groups, and a national forum for urban library workers, the study outlines in some of its key points that “Every person has a right to a safe workplace, yet public librarians are not given these protections” and that “witnessing and experiencing violence is increasingly becoming the norm in public libraries.”

The free flow of information that libraries present is at greater risk now than it’s ever been. The American Library Association wrote in September of last year to the FBI, urging the government to take a more vested interest in the safety of public libraries in the wake of threats across the country. A similar press release went out in March of this year condemning similar bomb threats still taking place, including a series of bomb threats against Hilton Central District Schools in New York.

If you’re looking to protect and support your local library, now’s a great time to attend your library’s public board meetings, or even become a board member yourself. Or, if nothing else, do something nice for the librarian friends in your life. They’re really going through it right now.

(featured image: Jiahui Huang/Flickr)