I think public libraries are great, but I found this funny today. Funny in a “people are utterly incapable of putting basic statistics into context these days” kind of way.
There’s this guy in the UK who doesn’t like public libraries.
Nobody goes to libraries anymore. Close the public ones and put the books in schools. https://t.co/Cimy1V81n5
— Andre Walker (@andrejpwalker) October 22, 2017
I'm serious, what adults use libraries. Almost none.
— Andre Walker (@andrejpwalker) October 24, 2017
Then this happened:
Dear #Library users, I surrender! pic.twitter.com/1F0cog6xo0
— Andre Walker (@andrejpwalker) October 24, 2017
People are retweeting his “surrender” and celebrating victory.
By my calculations, what on Twitter seems to be an overwhelming outpouring of support by 110,000 people for public libraries in the UK is: 0.2% of the adult population of the UK.
Zero point two percent.
I counted everyone over 24 as “an adult.” I figured people 24 and under might be in school or college and be more likely to *require* the services of a library. I probably should have *excluded* toddlers and such, but I didn’t.
That assumes all 110,000 of those Twitter people reside in the UK, too, which they undoubtedly don’t, so that percentage of library supporters can only be adjusted downward from vanishingly small to infinitesimally small.
By the way, I may have rounded some numbers up or down during my calculations, so it’s *possible* that figure isn’t precisely accurate. Don’t @ me bro. And yes, I know it’s not a scientific study and yada, yada, yada.
The point is, if Andre Walker “surrendering” is supposed to make me think that Twitter just proved adults overwhelming use and love public libraries, it didn’t. In fact it made me think more of the opposite. The guy who said “how ignorant and entitled can you be” should feel like a dope right now, because he inadvertently helped prove Andre Walker’s point.
Incidentally, I’m an adult and I haven’t been to a public library in probably 10 years. I could probably count the times I’ve been to one as an adult on my hands. I don’t have a library card and don’t even know how to get one or if I even need one anymore. I don’t even know where my local library is. And why should I have to *go* to a library anyway? Can’t I just use a web site?
But don’t be like me. It’s nice to know libraries are there, and I don’t want them to go away. I always thought it would be cool to work at a library, actually. I’d make them more accessible online. :)
