“They deserve better than being lumped in with murderers and tyrants.” – Former Minneapolis resident Keith Saunders, an ex-library employee now living in Taiwan–understandably angry over the use of images of Mao Tse-tung and J. Edgar Hoover to promote the Minneapolis public library and librarians.
The TeleRead take: If you get a chance, Keith, why not show the campaign to some Chinese in Taiwan? I suspect their reaction will be the same as mine. To use a butcher like Mao to promote a public library is like using Adolph Hitler as a happy beer-guzzler to promote Coors, or burning crosses to promote “freedom of speech” here in Virginia. I feel sorry for anyone too “hip” to grasp the implied racism here. Supposedly Mao is “on hold,” but will the MPL Friends group bring him back?
Local daily still mute on controversy: Still nothing, apparently, in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune as of this wrting.
The MPLIC advertising campaign is really pissing up the wrong rope here. But they think they’re “hip” by invoking Mao and J. Edgar Hoover (who appears quite queenly). What next? That picture of George W. Bush holding “The Hungry Little Goat” book upside down?
Everyone should make note of the advertising agency that came up with these fascinating ideas – and then avoid it like the plague.
This story is getting weirder. The Star-Trib itself gave $500,000 to the new library campaign. As much as as I favor well-funded libraries, I wonder if that could be influencing the newspaper’s coverage.
Hey, just checking into your site to see what’s up. I should clarify that it is true I used to live in Minneapolis for a while, but my library employment was in St. Paul. This information wasn’t explicitly clear in my letter, though my point was being made, in part, as someone who was once employed by a library. Technically, I was a book shelver, check-out clerk kind of guy. I also worked a few years at the Macalester College library as a student. Just keeping the records straight. It may look as though I once worked at the Minneapolis libraries.
My concern then, as stated, comes as a former Twin Cities resident and as an ex-employee of a public library, among other roles.
BTW, MPR had my open letter on their commentary page.
Thanks for the the additional information, Keith. Regardless of where you worked at a library, you certainly would be well qualified to speak out on the issue of library employees being associated with a butcher such as Mao. – David