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Letter to the editor, Aug. 12 Friday Aug 12, 2016 at 12:01 AM Censorship is wrong As a professor and librarian with a master's degree in library science, I would like to point out that what OSF Executive Director Cynthia Rider and others have done by initiating a boycott of the Shakespeare Books & Antiques bookstore is censorship. Censorship is defined on the American Library Association's Intellectual Freedom and Censorship page as follows: "Censorship is the suppression of ideas and information that certain persons — individuals, groups or government officials — find objectionable or dangerous. It is no more complicated than someone saying, 'Don’t let anyone read this book, or buy that magazine, or view that film, because I object to it!' Censors try to use the power of the state to impose their view of what is truthful and appropriate, or offensive and objectionable, on everyone else. Censors pressure public institutions, like libraries, to suppress and remove from public access information they judge inappropriate or dangerous, so that no one else has the chance to read or view the material and make up their own minds about it. The censor wants to prejudge materials for everyone." Banned books displays are vehicles by which libraries, bookstores and other entities point out materials that have been challenged in the past for the edification of others. It is not much different than a Shakespeare play that challenges an audience's sensibilities when using a female in a typically male role. A banned books display is not a shrine for the best of human behavior. It is a display that begs us to ask, "Why?" OSF, led by Cynthia Rider, Bill Rauch and some individuals who feel offended by a censorship display, really need to ask themselves, "Why?" To question the display is a good thing because it creates the dialogue. To seek censorship is wrong. Dale Vidmar Ashland