i've seen that post about how homeless people don't cause problems in libraries going around a few times, & it's incredibly irritating to me

in my experience as a library worker, most of the people that were asked to leave or banned from the library were homeless. a few of these people did do genuinely disruptive things (shout at staff, make harassing comments, get into physical altercations), but most of them were banned from the library because the library's set of rules was fundamentally unfair and often enforced unfairly by staff, contracted security guards, and other patrons. people were banned for sleeping in the library, or eating in the library, or bringing too many bags into the library, or being quietly drunk in the library. none of these rules should result in banning someone from service & the only reason that they do is because our library rules were intended to make sure the library was 'safe for families' and 'not a day shelter.' if you feel that your public library doesn't do the same, i'd love to see the code of conduct.

there's a popular idea that libraries are havens for everyone, and they can be, but that's no guarantee that each one is; like every other public place, marginalized people are subject to the whims of the people who write and enforce building rules, and library workers aren't somehow exempt from bigotry. in addition, many front-line library staff are under pressure from administrators to aggressively enforce these deliberately unfair rules, because library administrators are personally bigoted or because they are themselves under pressure from library boards, local government, or vocal patrons.

i also think that post kind of valorizes the idea that homeless patrons behave well (whatever we may imagine that to mean) in the library because they are sensitive to how reactive rule enforcement can be & are trying not to get kicked out, which i find morally repugnant. why should we celebrate that someone is so used to being forcibly excluded that they work to placate us before we even express disapproval? i have had many interactions with library patrons who were clearly being polite to me in a way that, to me at least, felt like it was a performance directed at my white (presumed) womanhood. i found it jarring & unpleasant to be treated like a possible agent of harm, but that's my problem and not the patron's fault; i don't understand why anyone would take being treated that way as their due. i have had patrons apologize to me for being upset by clearly terrible circumstances or visibly shut down to avoid being emotional in public. i don't know how to navigate that from behind a service desk & frankly my perspective here is not the important one, but it feels worth pointing out that these are not a positive or neutral social interactions; they're evidence of a situation in which marginalized patrons are forced to treat library workers like a barrier & a threat. the fact that i personally would never eject someone from the library for being upset, much less for sleeping, doesn't come into it, because how could it? we met five minutes ago, if that.

library workers, in my experience, like to think of themselves as a part of a vital social infrastructure, performing a kind of secular (well, not always) missionary work. we tend to our communities. we nurture and guide. & i can't wholly exempt myself here: i was drawn to library work in part because i think it can be valuable, because i enjoy being helpful to other people. to some degree library workers, like social workers & nurses, all participate in the disciplinary arm of white womanhood, & i don't think it's professionally responsible or ethically defensible to decline to grapple with those implications, however uncomfortable. you don't have to lie about what a library is for libraries to be worthwhile, come on