Please show me where the ALA endorses kids being freely allowed to view porn in libraries. Perhaps the ALA opposes filters, but I don't think they endorse allowing children to view pornography.
As I said earlier on the thread, I word for a school system which has filtering software installed - it doesn't discriminate between adults and children; it filters for all of us. Some objectionable sites still get through. In general, I think the software is a bit overzealous: some useful sites such as Free Republic are blocked. I don't think filtering software is a perfect solution. I think in general children should be accompanied by parents who are monitoring their behavior in any public place, including a library.
And just because you have never seen it does not mean it does not happen.
Do you have any evidence that it's happening with any great frequency?
From the ALA website: "Censorship is a change in the access status of material, based on the content of the work and made by a governing authority or its representatives. Such changes include exclusion, restriction, removal, or age/grade level changes." Further, in the "Library Bill of Rights": "A person’s right to use a library should not be denied or abridged because of origin, age, background, or views."
Add to that the part they played in the challenges to the Child Online Protection Act and their position is pretty clear.
I don't think filtering software is a perfect solution. I think in general children should be accompanied by parents who are monitoring their behavior in any public place, including a library.
The obvious problem with that is parents cannot be with their kids 24/7. They have to work or go to the bathroom or sleep or whatever. The other problem with that is how easy it is to drop into a pornographic website by accident.
My favorite example of this is suppose you want to visit the POTUS's website. The address is www.whitehouse.gov. But not everyone knows that, and may by mistake type in www.whitehouse.com. If you do that, you go right to a pornographic website. And with a lot of these places, they like to flood your screen with pop-ups that multiply whenever you close one of them. Getting there may be an accident, but the url registry and unrelenting pop-ups are not.
So thinking that just removing the filters and standing behind your kid's shoulder with your fingers crossed will work out is really nothing more than a Pollyanic dream.
The ALA recommends sites to kids that are pornographic. The Go Ask ALice which ALA links kids to, discusses 'safe' rimming, fisting and many other inappropriate topics.
I think grownups should view their pornography at home or in some private location.
The library is a public square -- ya don't have the unalienable right to do anything there.