SOPA, PIPA, and an angry librarian's rant.

It's a little late to the ball as it were, but SOPA and PIPA were rampant in the news lately. The most visible of the protests against these bills was the blackout of Wikipedia (which wasn't really a blackout, you could get around it). The thing that irked me the most about this was not really the bills themselves (I'll get to that later) but the comments made both online and on the news about Wikipedia's blackout. "Oh wherever will people get information today? The library? Ha!"

Umm, yes, people can get information about things at the library. That is what a library is for, in fact. I was appalled at the negative vibe that was being sent out about libraries. No, people weren't saying that libraries were bad, it was more along the lines of libraries are jokes.
How did this get put into our culture? And how does the way we see libraries change so damn quickly?
Just recently, with the economy being in the crapper and people losing jobs and cutting costs every way they can, libraries were heralded for being there for the community. For free, libraries let you check out books, movies, games, and you can use the computer to update your resume, check your email and apply for jobs. People got rid of their Internet at home to save money and used the library as a way to stay connected. They stopped spending money on Netflix and Blockbuster and Red Box and Barnes and Noble and started using the library.
Libraries are being cut when we need them the most--they all cried.
I did see fellow librarians, me included, post that if someone needed some information that they thought they could only get through certain websites that were participating in the SOPA/PIPA blackout that you can get that information from the library (call, email, text or chat, people!). But was there a story about that? Was there a surge in people seeking out their local library to find information? Probably not.
More has to be done to show people that libraries are important in communities and you can't believe everything you read online.
Example: SOPA is dead!!
No, it's not. It's on the shelf. It will be revised and brought back probably under a different name, but the dangers of censorship will be there, and all because that movie executive and that music executive won't get to buy their 5th car and their 3rd home this year.
Try living on a librarian's salary and see how far you go.