Christian Actor Kirk Cameron Wins Battle to Read His Books in Libraries
“now are offering to work with him on room bookings after he challenged their denials and threatened to ‘assert’ his “rights in court”
The actor Kirk Cameron, a traditional values Christian, recently appeared on the Tucker Carlson show to discuss how he was denied the right to read a children’s book in various libraries.
The obvious irony here is the prevalence of ‘drag queen story hour’ events happening in libraries across the country. Why can’t Cameron read his book if they are allowed to happen? According to him, some libraries told him that his book clashed with their values.
Watch the segment below:
Since that appearance, Cameron has had much better luck with libraries and is winning this battle.
FOX News reports:
Kirk Cameron declares a ‘win’ over two public libraries that denied him story hours but now have ‘caved’
In comments to Fox News Digital over the weekend, actor and writer Kirk Cameron declared that he has “won” against two public libraries in this country that previously denied him the space and opportunity to hold a children’s book story hour program in their facilities — and that now are offering to work with him on room bookings after he challenged their denials and threatened to “assert” his “rights in court.”
In short, “they caved,” his publisher told Fox News Digital this weekend.
The public libraries — both of which held “drag queen story hours” in their facilities this past June, as well as other programs that promote and celebrate diversity of thought and belief — now are in communication with his publisher about the bookings for his story hour program for kids, he said.
Fox News Digital was shown the email exchanges between him and the two libraries as proof of the forward progress, as well as the details of the room bookings for later this month at the libraries.
Cameron, a well-known actor, writer and producer who first found fame on the TV sitcom “Growing Pains,” is the author of the new book, “As You Grow.”
It’s an illustrated children’s book and part of a series that celebrates the positive qualities of kindness, joy, patience, compassion and other biblical values.
This story is an excellent reminder that when the left talks about diversity, what they really mean is the silencing and forcing out of conservatives and traditional values.
Kirk Cameron declares a 'win' over two public libraries that denied him story hours but now have 'caved' https://t.co/PVmFRLpOcm
— Fox News (@FoxNews) December 19, 2022
Featured image via YouTube.
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Comments
If they were denying him the right to book a room for a private event on the same terms as they allow other people to do so, then he was correct and their lawyers must have told them not to be stupid and give him what he wants.
But are the drag queen story hours also private events, with the library merely providing the space as it does to anyone? Or are they official library events? Because if they are library events, then the library is not required to let him have an equivalent reading.
Government entities are required to be neutral regarding other people’s speech; but they are allowed to have their own opinions and values (so long as they are not religious), and when speaking for themselves they are not required to be neutral about those. So if the library’s own values are leftist, it can refuse to host an official event that is inconsistent with those values.
So to sum up, the business you create and run with your own money and effort is required to bake the cake and serve the jihadi; but a government entity is free to shun the sacred and promote the profane.
That makes sense.
That’s right up there with the gun-banners’ perennial contention that they can ban guns from public parks because public parks are the “private property of the government.”
Thank you!
I’m reading his comment and wondering at what point he begins to understand that public libraries are government facilities that can not viewpoint discriminate. A recent SCOTUS case busted Boston for this same nonsense recently. Boston has a flag pole in which private entities can apply to raise their flag. Christian groups were denied. If you have the flag pole/story hours you can’t discriminate as a government entity.
NotCoach, you are the one who does not understand. It is absolutely clear, black on white law that government entities, when speaking for themselves, are entitled to discriminate between views. They do not have to pretend not to have their own opinions. What they’re not allowed to do is discriminate between OTHER people’s opinions. They can’t allow people they agree with to use their facilities, while denying the same opportunity to those they disagree with.
The Boston case is exactly on point. The dispute there was over WHO IS SPEAKING when a flag is run up the pole. The city’s position was that it is the city speaking; the only role private entities play is in suggesting flags that the city may or may not choose to put up. If that is correct, then it’s obvious that it may choose which flags it puts up and which it doesn’t.
But the court agreed with the plaintiffs, that the flags are NOT the city’s speech at all. That it is not flying those flags itself, it is allowing various outside entities to fly them, and that everyone understands this, so that flying a flag is not seen by anyone as a city endorsement. And in that case it can’t discriminate.
Every governmental entity that wants to discriminate is always going to use the bogus claim that it is their speech. The libraries are not the speakers, but the facilitators. They are only the speakers when it is ONLY the library saying something. So your point is absolute nonsense, and the libraries most likely capitulated because of that flagpole case seeing the writing on the wall.
NotCoach, if it is the library itself that organized and hosted the drag queen hour, then that is absolutely the library’s own speech, and there is not a court in the land that will ever order it to give anyone else “equal time” to express a different view.
The only case in which Kirk Cameron could win is if the library did not host the drag queen hour, but merely rented out its space to some outside group that approached it. In that case it must accommodate anyone else who wants the space, applying viewpoint-neutral rules.
NO, you idiot. How are you not understanding this? It is extremely simple. YOUR business is free to express any view it likes. It is not governed by the first amendment at all. It is also free to discriminate between customers based on any criterion it likes, except those specifically listed in the laws applicable in that jurisdiction. It may not discriminate between customers on listed grounds, but it is STILL not required to make its own statements supporting them. So yes, since religion is a covered ground under federal law, and thus in all jurisdictions within the USA, you must serve the jihadi. You must sell him cakes on the same terms you offer to other customers. But you are NOT required to speak a jihadist message yourself. You are not required to invite a jihadist to speak in your store, or to put up a poster there.
The only question before the courts now is whether baking a cake with a message on it is the same thing as yourself expressing that message. Everyone agrees that if it is, then you are free to refuse to do so. Some claim that decorating a cake is not your expression, it’s the customer’s, and so they claim you can’t discriminate between messages you’re willing to write on their behalf. They’re wrong, but it will take time for the supreme court to drum it into their heads.
But in most jurisdictions political views are NOT a listed ground, so everyone agrees that you ARE free to refuse to decorate a cake with a Democrat slogan, even if that counts as the customer’s speech.
However a government entity is MORE restricted than you are. It is free to refuse to express for itself views it disagrees with, not must it allow others to use its space to express their views, but if it does so for people it agrees with it must also do so for groups it disagrees with.
admin. He’s calling people names!!!
Fortunately, not being a snowflake, I don’t in the least feel unsafe, or directly threatened, or in danger of my life, or whatever is the usual incantation to Moloch that such people invoke.
I am an originalist who believes that (among other freedoms) my freedom of association and my freedom from compelled work (slavery) are absolute, any bullshit statute to the contrary. That such statutes exist does not weaken my argument in the least, any more than the statutes of 200 years ago legitimizing slavery excused the total immorality of slavery.
I believe that what is (often very loosely) decried as “bigotry” is at worst a vice and not a crime, and at best in certain cases can be circumstantially justifiable. In either event, I believe such freedom persists, if only due to the principle that “if you are not free to make mistakes, you are not free.”
I furthermore believe that the government itself has no such “right,” but is constrained to treat everybody equally under the law.
Milhouse analyzes the problem with respect to the current state of statutes and case law. And yet, statutes get reversed by other statutes (gendered bathroom use); statutes get reversed by case law (“good reason” state gun laws and Bruen); and even case law gets reversed by other case law (Schenck’s “fire in a crowded theatre;” Dobbs replacing Roe). Throughout all these gymnastics, the constitution remains uniquely irreversible.
Looking at the question solely from the perspective of statutes and case law is the mindset of the sort of people who conclude that Madoff and Bankman-Fried are offering them really great deals: “Considering all the details from down here in the weeds, your strategy hangs together pretty nicely… but when I dolly back and look at it from 200 feet, I can plainly see the damn alligators!”
Henry, when the government speaks for itself it is treating everyone equally. None of them is speaking. It is speaking for itself, so it is speaking only its own opinions. I don’t understand how you can claim that anything in the constitution prevents a government entity from having its own opinions!
I presume that you’re correct, but, I’ll confess that I’m not following the constitutional standard on viewpoint discrimination. If the drag queen events are deemed to be non-private, “library” events, it’s okay for a library — using public funds, of course — to host such events, but, to reject a devoutly religious author’s desire to host a similar event? If that’s constitutionally permissible; it seems grossly inequitable, because the events that the library hosts will naturally reflect the political leanings/biases of its administrators, while the funding for such events are derived from a broad swathe of taxpayers holding diverse views, and, their ability to hear alternate viewpoints is being constrained by the library administrators political predilections and their hostility towards alternate viewpoints.
The distinction is very simple. The library is allowed to have its own point of view, and to host only events that comport with that view. So if it hosts a drag queen event it is NOT required to also host an event expressing the opposite view. This is not even slightly controversial; it’s black letter law.
However if the library makes its space available for OTHER people to host events, then it cannot discriminate between potential hirers of the space based on their viewpoint. It can’t make the space available only for drag queens but not for Mr Cameron, or vice versa. That is not really controversial either, but there are a lot of government entities that seem not to understand it until their noses are rubbed in it.
I appreciate the explanation, but, I still can’t reconcile myself to the inequitable end result that adherence to this constitutional standard produces.
What’s inequitable about it? Do you deny that the library, like anyone else, has the right to its own opinions?! And the right not to be forced to express opinions contrary to its own?!
Yes, I do deny it. (Cock crows in the distance)
“The library” isn’t a private association. It’s a government agency. It is constrained to serve people equally, under the law. It has no right to an “independent” opinion. If its controlling body (town hall, county board) has enacted opinionated ordinances and statutes (such as “no wearing ‘colors'”), it is allowed to mouth and enforce those, as necessary. Otherwise, its duty is to do its job and shut its mouth.
Agencies have opinions. They all do, all the time. Those opinions are determined by whoever lawfully controls them. For instance the US government as an entity has opinions (also known as “policies”) which are determined by the president. The individual departments have opinions determined by the secretaries he has delegated to run them for him, or by the people the secretaries have delegated. States and cities likewise have opinions. And there is simply no controversy at all, that these entities are entitled to the same first-amendment right that everyone else has, to express their opinions and not to express contrary opinions. I just don’t understand how you can even imagine it could be otherwise. How can you justify such a position in the text of the first amendment?
Henry, the library is serving people equally. That does not and has never meant it must supply whatever services anyone wants. It chooses which services to supply and which not, and it is entitled to decide that it will supply drag queen story hours and not Cameron Kirk story hours. Or public lectures by people who believe in glowball warmening and not by people who don’t believe in it. So long as it is the library providing the lectures, I don’t understand how you can imagine it must promote all viewpoints equally.
The public library is free to not allow any viewpoint expression in its building but they are not allowed to pick and choose which viewpoints are allowed as a general matter. If they allow the Federalists for public story time then they gotta let in the anti Federalists for public story time. The library can always choose not to allow any groups access but if they let in one then the rest follow.
That is only the case if these are both private events. If it allows the Federalists to host a story time on its premises, then it may not deny the anti-Federalists the opportunity to do the same, on the same terms.
But if it decides to host a Federalist event itself then it is under absolutely no obligation to also host an anti-Federalist event. Nor is it required to allow anti-Federalists to hire its space in order to host one themselves, if it doesn’t generally do so for other groups. But the moment it lets some other group — any other group — host an event, then it must offer the anti-Federalists the same terms.
That you can’t see, from first principles, that this state of affairs turns the concept of constitutional rights entirely on its head is really disturbing.
But it doesn’t. It takes a really twisted view of reality to imagine that it does. Why should a government entity be compelled to express views that it diasgrees with? On what grounds?
I have disagreed with some of your conclusions before, but always saw the logic you were presenting and could see the point you were trying to make. I respect that and generally enjoy your comments even when I disagree.
This time…..I’ve got nothing. I don’t see how a government entity can viewpoint discriminate based on the political leanings of their administration. That appears unconstitutional on it’s face.
Milhouse tends to concentrate myopically on what is statute law and case law, and tends to ignore what is right and/or what is constitutional. In other words, a perfect modern lawyer or congressman.
“Milhouse tends to concentrate on what the law actually says, instead of what I want it to say.”
FTFY.
Exactly. The law is what it is, and the courts have been very very clear about it. I am not putting forth some controversial theory; there is NO CONTROVERSY about this.
Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add “within the limits of the law,” because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.
–THOMAS JEFFERSON
Because it is expressing its own viewpoint. It is speaking for itself, not for others. And it is entitled to do that JUST AS ANYONE ELSE IS. The government itself has the same freedom of speech as anyone else, and cannot be compelled to say things it doesn’t agree with. But it can be compelled to treat OTHERS equally regardless of their viewpoints.
“It” is not a free entity. “It” is an agency of government. There is no “itself.”
Government has no rights. Government has powers—constrained, delegated powers.
The chief librarian has the personal “right” to promote any point of view she wishes… on her own time, with her own funds, on non-government property. Same basic principle as the Hatch Act.
“Government can do as we please, but citizens can’t” stands the constitution entirely on its head. Continuing to justify such practices in any way is as self-defeating as failing to reject the left’s gaslighting language of equity, women’s health, anti-racism, and “investment.”
“Government can do as we please, but citizens can’t”
That is just a lie. Citizens can. Citizens not only can promote their views with their own resources, the moment a government entity allows citizens to use its resources to express their own views it can’t pick and choose which citizens will have that privilege. But if it is not allowing anyone to use its resources, then it can’t be forced to. You would compel all governments to open all their resources for public use! That makes no sense.
“You would compel all governments to open all their resources for public use! That makes no sense.”
And yet, it makes sense for government to compel cake bakers to do the same.
That’s your argument?
I denounce it.
Your very generous to him
Your definition of “religion” is flawed. Try reading this. It applies to public libraries as well as to public schools.
https://blogs.cornell.edu/envirobaer/publications/why-a-functional-definition-of-religion-is-necessary-if-justice-is-to-be-achieved-in-public-education/
It is not my definition, it is the law’s definition, and it is also the universally accepted definition.
Hah! Wield the double-edged scalpel, and get scalped. Here’s to American exceptionalism. Good job, Mr. Cameron.