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diversity
Small Town Libraries Don't Want Imported Book Bans
This National Library Week, support librarians by opposing censorship.
Apr 24, 2023
Growing up in Milwaukee, the local branch of the public library was always just a bus ride away. But when my family moved to central Pennsylvania when I was entering high school, we lived in a rural region that didn't even have a public library.
In the '90s, before the internet was widely available, the loss of a robust library system left me feeling cut off from the world. This is one reason I've spent the last 20 years living in a rural community, where I serve as library director for a school district.
After decades building resources and capacity in our small school districts, some of which don't even have a public library, it's been devastating to see the growing ferocity of attacks against our libraries over the past couple of years.
Our small town school districts and public libraries are facing immense pressure from national groups that turn massive external funding into fake grassroots outrage in our communities.
More than half of U.S. state legislatures have proposed or passed bills that would severely restrict access to information, threaten First Amendment rights, and punish entire communities by withholding funding critical library services—all for the sake of keeping books off the shelf that do not suit the taste of a few individuals.
Our small town school districts and public libraries are facing immense pressure from national groups that turn massive external funding into fake grassroots outrage in our communities. The grassroots origins are fake, but the outrage is very real.
The outrage we see on the news is not a reflection of our small towns: It's imported by groups that aim to overwhelm and tear down our public schools and libraries. Book challenges of yesteryear were often sparked by a child bringing home a single book that prompted parents' concerns. Today's attempts to ban books are overwhelmingly driven by externally generated lists.
According to the American Library Association, 40% of book challenges in 2022 involved requests to ban 100 or more books at a time. Most of these books were either by or about LGBTQ+ folks and people of color.
This outrage over diversity in literature does not reflect the increasing diversity in our small towns. According to the Housing Assistance Council, in 2018 there were more than 2,000 rural and small-town census tracts where racial and ethnic minorities made up the majority of the population. In another study, the Movement Advancement Project in 2019 showed that an estimated three million or more LGBTQ+ people called rural America home.
When censors come after books that reflect the diversity in a community, they're attempting to erase the stories of community members themselves.
School librarians like me strive to build diverse collections that bring the world to the shelves of every town and ensure that every reader finds their story. When readers find their own stories in a library, they read more and grow into lifelong learners.
Such robust collections are built through professional—not ideological—standards, and every student benefits.
Access to books that represent a variety of cultures and viewpoints may boost a student's development and well-being, according to a 2022 white paper from the Unite Against Book Bans coalition. Diverse books also cultivate empathy and provide a springboard for families to have meaningful conversations.
From coast to coast and across the heartland, Americans remain overwhelmingly committed to libraries, despite what manufacturers of moral panic may claim.
Recent polling shows large majorities of voters across party lines reject the idea of banning books from school and public libraries. Ninety percent of voters have high regard and trust for librarians, and similar percentages say that school and public libraries play an important role in their community.
As we move into National Library Week, I hope Americans will join me and 90% of our neighbors in supporting libraries and librarians—and in rejecting the manufactured outrage of book banning groups.
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The Right Embraces Shareholder Activism in War on So-Called "Woke" Capitalism
Right-wing shareholder proposals that target environmental, social, and governance (ESG) frameworks are up 60% compared to this time last year.
Apr 21, 2023
After years of criticizing progressives for shareholder activism focused on social justice and environmental concerns, right-wing groups and ideologues are embracing the same strategy themselves.
At publicly held companies, right-wing shareholder proposals that target environmental, social, and governance (ESG) frameworks are up 60% compared to this time last year, according to the 2023 Proxy Previewreport published by the nonprofits As You Sow, the Sustainable Investments Institute, and Proxy Impact.
Of the hundreds of shareholder resolutions that have been filed so far in 2023, the report identifies 43 proposals that decry corporate attempts to redress climate inaction, racial inequity, abortion restrictions, and gun violence. Additional anti-ESG proposals are likely to be filed in advance of annual shareholder meetings, which usually take place in May.
Most of the proposals come from groups that are key players in the Right's war on "woke" capitalism.
Groups Leading the Charge
The National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR), a right-wing advocacy group, has filed at least 17 anti-ESG proposals with various corporations this year, the most of any conservative organization profiled in the report. NCPPR has spearheaded a campaign it calls Stop Corporate Tyranny, which rails against "cancel culture" and accuses corporations of both allowing themselves to be weaponized against "traditional American values" and silencing conservative perspectives in adopting "the progressive Left's extreme and radical agenda."
Quoting Fox News host Tucker Carlson, NCPPR claims that "the biggest threat to liberty is no longer big government, its [sic] big business."
NCPPR claims that "the biggest threat to liberty is no longer big government, its [sic] big business."
The campaign is part of NCPPR's Back to Neutral Coalition, which includes the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the right-wing corporate bill mill that works with state lawmakers across the country to enact pro-corporate legislation. ALEC chief executive Lisa Nelson is a member of the NCPPR board.
The National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC), another major anti-woke culture warrior, has filed the second most anti-ESG shareholder proposals this year. A former associate member of the State Policy Network (SPN), a right-wing coalition of free market think tanks, the so-called "watchdog" group has received funding from major right-wing donors, including the Sarah Scaife Foundation.
The majority of NLPC's proposals are concerned with "ties to Communist China" and have been filed with large multinational corporations such as Starbucks, McDonald's, Merck, General Motors, Boeing, and Apple. A different resolution targeted at Meta, the parent company of Facebook, demands a report on "government censorship."
Climate Change
Corporate policies that attempt to curb fossil fuel use and address the climate crisis have long raised the ire of right-wing groups—many of which receive major funding from the oil and gas industry.
NLPC filed memos with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) urging shareholders at Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and Wells Fargo to vote against proposals asking the banks "to take additional actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions." Shareholder meetings for all four financial institutions are being held next week.
Steven Milloy, a former Fox News columnist and lobbyist for the tobacco and fossil fuel industries who currently sits on the board of the libertarian Heartland Institute, filed a shareholder proposal with Alliant Energy pressing the company to justify its "pure fantasy" of ever achieving net-zero emissions.
Milloy also filed a proposal at Chevron that would require the energy giant to rescind its 2021 emissions reduction pledge. The proposal appears to have been crafted in conjunction with Strive Asset Management, the company founded by anti-woke firebrand and 2024 Republican presidential contender Vivek Ramaswamy.
Investment fund magnate David Bahnsen filed a proposal with Chevron demanding that the company establish a committee to analyze the risks associated with decarbonization goals, and NCPPR filed a similar proposal with Duke Energy.
Victims of "Diversity"
Six of NCPPR's shareholder proposals raise concerns about racial justice initiatives undertaken by companies, a leitmotif in the Right's attacks on "stakeholder capitalism" and ESG investing, along with alleged reverse racism against white conservatives. Last year, the director's letter in NCPPR's Investor Value Voter Guide 2022 promised that the guide would help proxies vote "against the new racism and sexism of 'equity'" and "other hard-left goals of so-called stakeholder capitalism and ESG." (The organization's 2023 guide has not yet been released.)
Other proposals focus on anti-discrimination and "viewpoint diversity." For instance, NCPPR's proposal for the grocery chain Kroger calls for a report detailing "the potential risks associated with omitting 'viewpoint' and 'ideology' from its written equal employment opportunity (EEO) policy." The SEC ruled that Kroger could omit the proposal.
NCPPR warns against "committing illegal or unconscionable discrimination against employees deemed 'non-diverse'" in the name of "so-called 'equity.'"
At Home Depot, NCPPR hopes to rescind the racial equity audit that shareholders agreed to at the company's 2022 annual meeting. In a proposal with McDonald's, NCPPR warns against "committing illegal or unconscionable discrimination against employees deemed 'non-diverse'" in the name of "so-called 'equity.'"
NCPPR also takes up claims of liberal media bias and "viewpoint discrimination" in its proposal filed with AT&T, which criticizes the company for not renewing DirecTV's contract with the right-wing One America News (OAN) in the wake of its incendiary coverage of the 2020 presidential election and the subsequent insurrection.
For reasons not disclosed, Inspire Investing, a "biblically responsible" investing firm that champions anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ views, ended up withdrawing its proposal on the "risks" associated with anti-discrimination policies, which it had filed with M&T Bank.
Abortion
NCPPR filed an anti-abortion proposal with Eli Lilly, the Indianapolis-based pharmaceutical company, in which it calls for a report on the "risks of supporting abortion." NCPPR takes issue with the company's position that its ability to attract "diverse employees" has been hindered since Indiana passed an abortion ban in 2022, and therefore, that it needs to focus its expansion efforts outside the state. NCPPR argues that Eli Lilly's embrace of diversity "ends at diversity of thought, opinion, and religious convictions." The board has recommended voting against the proposal.
Anti-abortion activist and semi-professional shareholder activist Thomas Strobhar also proposed a vote at Disney regarding transparency in charitable contributions. His organization, Life Decisions International, pressures companies to halt donations to Planned Parenthood.
Guns
NCPPR submitted a shareholder proposal to American Express that would have required the company to report on how it would "reduce the risk associated with tracking, collecting, or sharing information" regarding payment processing for the "sale or purchase of firearms." In March, the SEC ruled that American Express could omit the proposal from its proxy materials since it appeared to micromanage the company.
Gun control advocates have long urged credit card companies to track gun and ammunition purchases as a way of curtailing rampant gun violence and mass shootings. Lawmakers in states such as New York have pressured Mastercard and American Express—both based in New York—to flag suspicious gun purchases.
By contrast, Florida's Senate Bill 214—which penalizes financial companies for using a separate "merchant category code" for firearms—sailed through the Republican-controlled state senate in March and has crossed over into the house. The bill's lobbyists include Gun Owners of America, the political action arm of the Gun Owners Foundation, which has received funding from the right-wing Ed Uihlein Family Foundation and Shell Oil, according to tax filings.
Bahnsen filed a shareholder proposal with MetLife taking issue with the company's decision "not to offer a bulk discount to NRA members" and to exclude "firearms makers from investment portfolios."
Based on the gun industry's fear that President Biden will reinstate Operation Choke Point—an Obama-era program created to curtail bank fraud and discourage financial institutions from doing business with "high-risk merchants"—NLPC filed three identical proposals with JPMorgan Chase, Mastercard, and Wells Fargo to require the companies to report on any government requests to close accounts, along with their own policies for dealing with those requests. The SEC denied the proposals made to JPMorgan and Wells Fargo, and, in early March, NLPC withdrew a comparable proposal with Mastercard.
In a similar move, Bahnsen filed a shareholder proposal with MetLife taking issue with the company's decision "not to offer a bulk discount to NRA members" and to exclude "firearms makers from investment portfolios" (along with "coal companies and oil sands extractors"), according to Proxy Preview.
Bahnsen sits on the advisory board of the Viewpoint Diversity Score, a right-wing effort to negatively rate companies that take into account social justice concerns such as racial equity. The index, which is a project of the LGBTQ hate-group the Alliance Defending Freedom, received an Innovation Prize from the right-wing Heritage Foundation last year.
ESG as Good Business
Overall, the shareholder activism the Right has undertaken to counter corporate pressure from the Left has met with limited success. Anti-ESG proposals are typically unpopular with shareholders and on average garner 4% support or less. In addition, the volume of right-wing filings still pales in comparison with the number coming from progressive organizations. For example, As You Sow has filed at least 89 proposals this year, mostly related to advancing climate goals, diversity initiatives, and pro-union policies.
Other anti-ESG shareholder strategies—such as the new proxy advisory services launched by Ramaswamy's company Strive—appear to be gaining traction. Indiana's Public Retirement System recently rewarded Strive a $150,000 no-bid contract.
Social and climate risks have real impacts on the bottom line, and investors and customers increasingly expect businesses to take them into consideration.
Yet the overwhelming response from corporate boardrooms has been: ESG policies make financial sense. As Andrew Winston argued in the Harvard Business Review, "The banks pushing back on anti-ESG laws are not seeking medals for philanthropy; they're doing it because it's good business." Social and climate risks have real impacts on the bottom line, and investors and customers increasingly expect businesses to take them into consideration.
An entire generation of talent "won't stay with us if we don't care about ESG or purpose or whatever we call it," Mars CEO Poul Weihrauch toldFinancial Times last month. "So from my chair, I think it's a nonsense conversation. We don't believe that purpose and profit are enemies."
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DeSantis Targets Diversity Programs, Tenured Professors in 'Unhinged' Attack on Higher Ed
The union representing Florida's professors said it would "stand in lockstep opposition to any and all so-called 'reforms' that will actually destroy our state's world-class degree programs and their ability to serve our students."
Jan 31, 2023
Taking aim yet again at higher education, Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday proposed sweeping changes to the state's university system, including banning state funding for diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and critical race theory education, as well as forcing tenured professors to undergo reviews at any time.
Speaking during a press conference at the State College of Florida in Bradenton, DeSantis said he is asking the state Legislature to cut all funding for programs he believes are "ideological."
Referring to diversity, equity, and inclusion programs—which aim to promote fair treatment and full participation—and critial race theory, a graduate-level framework dealing with systemic racism, DeSantis said that "we're also going to eliminate all DEI and CRT bureaucracies in the state of Florida. No funding, and that will wither on the vine."
\u201cThis program was going to be launched by FAMU in April. Based on the Governor's remarks today via his unhinged press conference, he wants to CANCEL this program and ban it from receiving any public support. \n\nCanceling a program about DEI at an HBCU.\n\nLet that sink in.\u201d— Rep. Anna V. Eskamani \ud83d\udd28 (@Rep. Anna V. Eskamani \ud83d\udd28) 1675185477
Apparently not satisfied with a state law requiring tenured professors at state colleges and universities to undergo reviews every five years, DeSantis also called for legislation that would subject such educators to reviews at any time, at risk of their jobs.
"Yes, we have the five-year review of all the tenured faculty, which is, which is good… and the board of trustees has to determine whether they stay or go. But you may need to do review more aggressively than just five," he said.
"I've talked with folks around the country who've been involved in higher ed reform, and the most significant deadweight cost at universities is typically unproductive tenured faculty," the governor added. "And so why would we want to saddle you as taxpayers with that cost if we don't have to do that?"
United Faculty of Florida (UFF), the union representing college and university educators in the state, said it would fight DeSantis' proposals.
"The United Faculty of Florida stand in lockstep opposition to any and all so-called 'reforms' that will actually destroy our state's world-class degree programs and their ability to serve our students," UFF President Andrew Gothard said in a statement. "We will not allow Florida's future to be sacrificed for cheap political points."
\u201cRon DeSantis just held an UNHINGED press event promising to DEFUND Diversity, Equity, + Inclusion programs in all public colleges/universities.\n\nHis rants against \u2018political ideology\u2019 + \u2018indoctrination\u2019 are accusations in a mirror.\n\nHe wants total political censorship + control.\u201d— Carlos Guillermo Smith (@Carlos Guillermo Smith) 1675184661
Writing for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Francie Diep and Emma Pettit contended that "it's been a dizzying month for higher ed in the Sunshine State."
As the authors explained:
The recent avalanche of activity began in late December, when DeSantis' office requested that state colleges and universities list their spending on programs related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and critical race theory. Florida's Republican House Speaker, Paul Renner, later asked the same campuses to turn over a mountain of additional DEI-related information.
DeSantis' office also requested that state universities report data on transgender students, and he appointed six new trustees to the New College of Florida's board because, according to his press secretary, the small liberal arts institution has put "trendy, truth-relative concepts above learning."
"What I find most troubling is that DeSantis is putting out a blueprint for other governors and state legislatures,” Kristen A. Renn—a professor at Michigan State University who researches LGBTQ+ college issues—told The Chronicle of Higher Education. "He's doing these things in ways that anybody else can pick this up and do it."
DeSantis—a potential 2024 presidential candidate—has also come under fire for other policies and actions including rejecting a college preparatory African-American studies course, banning unapproved books from K-12 libraries, and the Stop WOKE Act, a CRT ban that applies to schools from the primary through university levels and is meant to combat what the governor called "wokeness as a form of cultural Marxism."
\u201cBanning books, banning DEI, and targeting trans students is all ok but having neo nazis like Nick Fuentes tabling on FSU's campus is ok. Welcome to DeSantis' Florida.\u201d— Alejandra Caraballo (@Alejandra Caraballo) 1674832846
Mia Brett, legal historian at The Editorial Board, last week compared Republicans' attacks on education across the country to similar moves by the leaders of Nazi Germany during the early months of their regime.
"I'm not being hyperbolic when I say this is directly out of Nazi laws passed in 1933. Though if this Republican effort is successful, you might not be able to learn things like that anymore," she wrote, adding that the legislation banning courses on CRT and racial and gender identity are a "chilling erosion of academic freedom and a huge step toward fascist academic control in the service of right-wing narratives."
\u201cI wrote for @johnastoehr last week about how republicans are using the Nazi playbook for fascist education control. Here\u2019s another example https://t.co/oD0X1j0EoN\u201d— Dr. Mia Brett (@Dr. Mia Brett) 1675179218
"While it's still legal to teach history, remember where such efforts have led and take them seriously," Brett ominously warned.
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