* Why, yes, there is!

Last week from a right wingnut republican member of Congress from the state of Louisiana:

Rep. Clay Higgins @RepClayHiggins
Over time, American communities will build beautiful, church owned public-access libraries. I’m going to help these churches get funding. We will change the whole public library paradigm.

The libraries regular Americans recall are gone. They’ve become liberal grooming centers.
12:53 PM · Mar 23, 2023

Clay Higgins (r) does not represent Missouri. I had to check, though. Heh.

Some of the responses:

Eat a roadkill armadillo, Clay.
When’s the last time you visited a library or read a book, ya doof?

Definitely never visited a public library.

have you considered seeing a therapist

Congrats man, you invented the dark ages

Heh. Someone just won the internets today.

What would you define as a “regular American?”

Dog whistle.

When was the last time you went to a library, or even read a book?

I love public and college libraries.
Have experienced zero grooming.
Stuffed my head full of facts & entertainment.
Ended up smarter than you.
(Grooming centers my ass. Went a couple days ago, & the librarian gave me a dirty look because my returned books had raindrops on them.)

Maybe you should’ve spent more time in libraries.
Might’ve ended up less dumb.
[….]

Rep. Higgins, I’m not sure “America but the Taliban are in charge” is quite the home run policy regime you seem to think it is.

“If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be. An informed citizenry is at the heart of a dynamic democracy.” — Thomas Jefferson.

Awesome, my church, The Church Of Beezlebub at Beaver Lick , would like to be one of the first. Should I call your office Monday to discuss how we can get this going or do you prefer another way?

“Grooming center”… like a barbershop? [….] #HereForTheRatio

What tripe.
I am a retired school and public librarian. How dare you say defamatory and patently false things about my life’s work.
If you want a Christian library, go for it, but to say that we are ‘groomers’ because we don’t subscribe to YOUR religious viewpoint is outrageous.

If you don’t believe in separation of church and state then you clearly don’t believe in the Bill of rights, meaning you don’t believe in what this country stands for or what it was built on. Leave government.

We are not a christo fascist nation. Separation of church and state, bro — also, churches need to pay taxes. Thanks for playing.

Church controlled libraries. Now they wanna monitor what citizens can and cannot read. And tell me again how the Republican Party stands for freedom?

Tell me you haven’t been to a library without telling me you haven’t been to a library

HEY! This is not a police church state. I do not want religious zealots saying what is ok to read. What you find unacceptable, I call art. Some thing that a person poured their time and ideas into. I DO NOT WANT YOU BE A PART OF YOUR CHURCH STATE!

You are everything that’s wrong with this country.

The people complaining the most about libraries don’t actually read books.

which church will be the correct one? ?

The last library I went into was full of books that you could check out, and it was open to the public, and there was 0 grooming going on, there was however, a lot of people… wait for it… reading [….]

Thanks for being honest about your plan to steal federal funds for Christians, I guess

So you want to give churches my tax dollars to build public libraries?

Why wouldn’t we cut out the middle man and build public libraries ourselves?

Thanks for your steadfast work and your steadfast love of The Lord! We have a chance with men like you willing to step into the gap.

Fewer than 50% of Louisiana students read at grade level. Maybe focus on that.

That’s considered a feature, not a bug.

You can build all the private Christofascist grooming book deposits you want…it will never happen with public funds because we have a constitution. Or, you could all move to an island and start your own Christian theocracy. We’d help you all pack.

WTF are you talking about? Churches are free to have their own libraries, most do. Federal funding for that is a big NO NO. We like our public libraries just the way they are.

Publicly funded libraries have always been a point of pride for America. It’s insanity to suggest that this should be abolished and replaced with church libraries. Unpatriotic.

Which churches are to get funding?

Just purely as a nonsensical and useless hypothetical for you to consider when asked.

Just churches.

Shouldn’t you consider maybe reading a book first?

Baby steps. Chunk it out.

And then we’ll put these private libraries in castles with moats, and we’ll have wealthy people, we’ll call them “lords” who’ll oversee them and have the uneducated masses, “serfs” you might call them, work the land. It will be just like the good old days. [….]

Gated communities would work, too.

It’s almost as if libraries are places of learning, and their open-minded and accessible values threaten those who would thrive in a society that increases their privilege…

I’d much rather see you invest in a Time Machine so you can go back to the Middle Ages you long for.

How many books are you going to ban? How much art?

Most of it.

“Church-owned library” would be the most boring place ever, though. You’d limit the selections so tightly that it wouldn’t be worth visiting. You’d populate it with anti-history and anti-science horsepucky. No, thank you.

Christofascist flex, but ok.

This is the most offensive and vapid tweet I have seen in a long time. Nobody cares about your idea of a library. We want religion out of politics and libraries where anyone is welcomed! Go away!

No we will not. Churches have and will continue to have private libraries but they will not replace our public libraries ever.
Those I know about have almost exclusively religious texts, usually with an emphasis on those significant to beliefs.

Sounds like you want to restrict information.

Nothing like a religious institution moderating knowledge

You should pick up a book sometime and read about what happens when churches control the books.

Please, as if you even know what a library is.

So will these libraries of your fantasy adequately represent the non-Christians in our nation or are they fresh out of luck?

That’s considered a feature, not a bug.

Keep your church out of my books!