I’ve got a big mouth

There, I’ve said it. If some­thing real­ly bugs me, I’m inclined to speak out from the pas­sion of my heart. I can’t help myself. Well, okay  I could help myself, but I choose not to. Some issues sim­ply need to see the light of day, and dis­cussing one’s pet peeves with a few close friends, hud­dled in a dark cor­ner, is no way to gen­er­ate move­ment, or change.

Of course, speak­ing one’s mind is almost always a risky busi­ness. That’s why I save my bull­horn for those top­ics that rile me the most. If I’m going to put myself in the posi­tion to be criticized—and any­one who speaks out on pret­ty  much any­thing can bank on crit­i­cism from some quarter—then I pre­fer to choose a top­ic that deeply con­cerns me. Take the ghet­to-iza­tion of chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture, or the pre­pos­ter­ous­ly short-sight­ed dwin­dling state and nation­al sup­port for school and pub­lic libraries and librar­i­ans, which is putting our democ­ra­cy at risk (don’t get me start­ed!). These are some of the sub­jects that get my blood boiling.

Can you affect changes in any of these areas? Well, we’ll nev­er know if we don’t speak up. So, here I’ll be, sound­ing off as the mood strikes.

It’s a start.

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