“LET BOOKS BE. Protect the freedom to read.” Those statements theme this year’s nationwide October 4-10 Banned Books Week. That event focuses on informing all of us about book censorship attempts in libraries, schools and bookstores.
Locally, Buckham Memorial Library is spotlighting Banned Books Week in two displays. There I read a list of 10 far-fetched reasons for banning books, according to the American Library Association. For example: Shel Silverstein’s A Light in the Attic “encourages children to break dishes so they don’t have to dry them.” Or “the basket carried by Little Red Riding Hood contained a bottle of wine, which condones the use of alcohol” from the story by Jacob and Wilhelm K. Grimm. Or “if there is a possibility that something might be controversial, then why not eliminate it?,” referencing Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown.
As I read down the list of ridiculous reasons for banning books, my jaw dropped. I laughed at the absurdity of it all. Really?
Because I’m a writer, an avid reader, a journalism school graduate who has worked as a newspaper reporter, and a strong supporter of First Amendment rights, I hold zero tolerance for banning books. If someone objects to the content of a book, then don’t read it. But don’t tell me I can’t read it. And certainly don’t pull it from a public space.
With kids, adults should consider age, maturity and the consequences of withholding a book from a child in their life. If I was a tween or adolescent and my parents or school banned a book, I’d probably try really hard to find a copy. Banning books from public libraries and schools is not a decision I can support. Ever.
I believe that knowledge is power. I’d rather a child be informed than uninformed. I’d rather a child learn from a reliable information source, such as a book, than “learn” from peers, social media or the internet. Or be kept in the dark. Kids are way smarter, know way more, than we adults realize.
All of those thoughts flitted through my mind as I viewed the two Banned Books Week displays at the Faribault library. Those displays featured books like Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou and The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.
I fingered the free LET BOOKS BE swag—bookmarks, buttons, wristbands, stickers—grabbing a few to show that I’m not OK with banning books.
We need only look at history, to Nazi Germany, to understand the devastating consequences of banning books. Consider May 1933, when 40,000 people gathered in the Berlin town square and burned some 20,000 books deemed as “un-German.” That is perhaps the most extreme example of book banning ever.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” wrote George Santayana in The Life of Reason in 1905, years before the book burnings in Nazi Germany. Now more than ever with attacks on the free press and on First Amendment rights, it’s important and necessary that we, and I don’t mean just librarians and teachers, stand strong against censorship, against book bannings.
To suggest that The Diary of Anne Frank should be censored because “it is a real ‘downer’” is among the far-fetched reasons given for banning a book on the ALA list I read at my local library. Imagine suppressing the voice of that remarkable teenager by pulling her diary from library shelves. I cannot fathom the thought of such absurdity, of Anne’s story left unread because someone objected. “LET BOOKS BE. Protect the freedom to read.”
FYI: To learn more about Banned Books Week and banned books, visit the American Library Association website by clicking here.
© Copyright 2026 Audrey Kletscher Helbling
Destructive ice, the help of community & more August 27, 2026
Tags: commentary, community, construction, Faribault, hail, hail damage, hailstorm, Hispanics, immigration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Minnesota, Operation Metro Surge, opinion, storm, United States of America
IN THE FOUR-PLUS MONTHS since destructive hailstones pummeled Faribault and the surrounding area, my community has been the site of ongoing exterior construction. Drive nearly anywhere in town and you will see roofing and siding crews or newly-repaired houses.
Seven hail-damaged houses within sight of mine, including ours, have been repaired, or have yet to be fixed. That’s a lot in a single neighborhood.
Business is booming for local and out-of-town roofers and other construction companies. Local contractors can’t possibly meet the immediate demand for work.
EMPATHETIC OBSERVATIONS
But blocks from my house, an underway construction project seems a community undertaking. I know because I talked with the owner. He bought the house with the intention of fixing and flipping it. Good for him if he can improve a dilapidated house and make money by selling it.
This particular renovation caught my eye because, when I passed by, I saw a house with rafters totally exposed, loose insulation inside and workers busy sheeting. Similar work was done on our house with new sheeting laid over the existing, mostly-solid roof boards. Rafters were not exposed. I appreciate that we now have a sturdier, straighter roof.
When I saw the condition of the flip house, my first thought was “that looks worse than ours (looked).” At least on the roof. I felt instant empathy for the homeowner. So, although I don’t usually stop at construction sites, I did at this one. I felt bad for the owner.
He just happens to be Hispanic. I learned from him that the Hispanic community is deeply connected. He tapped into the strength and skills of community for his house renovation. This did not totally surprise me. I’ve seen how Hispanic/Latino communities care for one another, how they work together, how they value family, culture and community.
If not for Hispanic roofing crews, hail-damaged houses in Faribault would go mostly unrepaired. These crews work hard and fast, putting in long days, often finishing roofs in a single day.
THE VALUE OF COMMUNITY
My conversation with the flip house owner got me thinking about other communities which come together to help one another on construction endeavors. In the past, and maybe even still today, the Amish raise barns in a day. Habitat for Humanity brings volunteers together to build homes alongside professionals. Decades ago, friends came over to help shingle our roof. During this past year, volunteers rehabbed a rental house owned by my church.
And in 1967, extended family arrived at my childhood family farm to help my dad and a local carpenter build our new home with a walk-out basement. If not for helpful family, I don’t think my parents could have built new. The cost would have been out of reach. We needed a new house to replace the cramped, drafty 1 1/2-story aged farmhouse with a partial dirt cellar, no bathroom, three small bedrooms, and an oil-burning stove centered in the living room.
WORSE THAN A HAILSTORM
All of this came to mind when talking with my new Hispanic acquaintance. I praised him for improving the neighborhood by buying and fixing up a run-down home. I also told him I’m sorry for the aggressive and often illegal detainment of Hispanics, Latinos and others by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during Operation Metro Surge (and beyond) in Minnesota. That includes right here in my city.
A recent media report states that the 5,000th immigrant detainee (since November 2025) was recently flown out of the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. That’s documented by a Minnesotan with boots on the ground at the airport video-taping departures of shackled detainees.
ICE has targeted Hispanic roofers. In December 2025, ICE arrived at a construction site in Chanhassen, southwest of Minneapolis, stranding two workers on a roof for hours during sub-zero temperatures resulting in hypothermia. In Bemidji in far northern Minnesota, roofing companies lost nearly all of their crews during ICE raids this summer. Many other such detainments have happened across the state and country and are ongoing.
Soon a new ICE detention center will open in a former abandoned private prison in Appleton in far western Minnesota. CoreCivic, a name familiar to anyone who has followed ICE actions, sold the prison to the federal government and is now contracted to run the detention center.
Suddenly that April hailstorm in Faribault doesn’t seem all that bad in comparison with what’s unfolding in this country. And I’m not talking only immigration. I’m also talking about government surveillance, an unnecessary war, tariffs, efforts to suppress voting rights (especially those of Black voters and of women), high gas and food prices, a failing economy and on and on. So much damage has been done to our country that will take years, if not decades, to recover, to repair the destruction hailed upon this nation.
© Copyright 2026 Audrey Kletscher Helbling