[list_indonesia] [ppiindia] Our Poor Libraries

From: "Ambon" <sea@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <"Undisclosed-Recipient:;"@freelists.org>
Date: Sat, 12 Mar 2005 05:14:15 +0100
** Mailing-List Indonesia Nasional Milis PPI-India www.ppi-india.da.ru **

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=13&section=0&article=60031&d=12&m=3&y=2005

Monday, 7, March, 2005 (26, Muharram, 1426)

      Our Poor Libraries
      Falah Al-Qahtani . Al-Watan 
        
      A visitor to any of our libraries, whether public or private, will soon 
realize how poor they are - lacking important books and references most 
sought-after by both students and researchers. In the absence of proper sources 
of information, researchers and students find themselves obliged to rely on 
poorly written, largely irrelevant notes or travel abroad in search of good 
sources for their research. Even after going abroad, the suffering and hassles 
continue; arriving in the Kingdom with a load of books is another obstacle.

      The censors are eager to examine the books and decide which ones should 
be allowed in and which should be confiscated. It is sad to note that many 
books are confiscated for reasons which are simply ridiculous. We still don't 
know on what basis books are prevented from entering the Kingdom; very often 
the subjects of those books have nothing to do with religion or politics and 
deal with purely academic matters. This leaves us with only one explanation; 
the ban is imposed by individuals who may know very little about the book and 
are acting on a whim. If this is the case, then we are faced with a most 
unfortunate situation.

      The shelves of our libraries bear the weight of many books, rows and rows 
of them with very similar titles and contents. The sheer number of such books 
creates in the reader's mind the impression that our libraries offer nothing 
but these boring books. It is no wonder that students, researchers and ordinary 
readers avoid entering them and have turned instead to the Internet in order to 
obtain the information they want. Even here, they are not left alone; the 
Internet itself is heavily censored with thousands of sites blocked.

      If some people believe that blocking sites and banning books arbitrarily 
for no real reason is a good educational tool, they are dead wrong. The people 
with such a mentality seem to live in the dark ages, not realizing that we live 
in a global village. A book published in one part of the world in the morning 
is available all over the world on the same day. Geographical boundaries no 
longer prevent the flow of information and, thanks to the Internet and other 
technology, information now transcends all man-made barriers.

      The policy of denying people access to information could very well 
backfire since they will resort to every possible means to get what they want. 
Banning and blocking provides free advertising for the very material which is 
considered objectionable. What the censors are doing is against all 
international norms; it is nothing less than an attack on human rights and 
intellectual freedom.

     
        


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[list_indonesia] [ppiindia] Our Poor Libraries

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