my mom i don't know, i get to the point of remember this, the book or not, but this is when kind of had her back. like, you know, mama bear takes the stage. so my mom is 411 know and i really so in court because i am suing these men and we're headed to louisiana court but you know, the men tried to sit behind me in so that my family i couldn't look at my family. and so my mom had of that and she's like, oh, hell no. and that my mom like she don't curse you that. but she was like and she like, is that what you talk about where she squeezed herself in between the two men she and her little feet could even hit the floor and she like it herself. and she's like, yeah. and coffin until they got up and laughed and they're like fine. we'll leave you. you. but my mom has.

yeah. something not in the book that i'll share is that my mom. very southern baptist in her belief system. and i my best friend is gay and he he lives. he moved away. but we've been best friends since junior high. high school and he was a part of our family. and i was a part of his family. and she always accepted. but since they retired, my parents do what retirees do intend to watch a lot of tv and a lot of that tv is fox news. some hate has been you know it's when you listen to something that is screaming all the time, you get angry and so their views kind changed. and so i was, you know, trying to explain to my mom, she's like, why do we have to defend? she said, these books and libraries are for everyone. everybody in the community pays taxes. everybody deserves to see

themselves is on the shelves and their their families represented, you know. and so she came with me to a library board meeting and this very book was being challenged called carefully and wonderfully made and it was a book for teenagers written by psychologists. and it was under attack and the people in the community saying it's pornographic. i didn't have anything of the sort in it, but a trans woman got up and spoke and and what i tell you was that that quote about sheik speak, even when you when you say that's yeah you even when your voice shakes and she was like you see her and she was crying and she but she got it out and she said this, this, this book can save lives this. it's got resources. it can help people like me from taking our own lives. she got so upset, ran out of the meeting after she spoke and and and my mom we got in the car that night and my mom started crying and she said, you know

what, amanda? she calls me amanda. beth because that's what melanie don't want amanda. beth i think books can save lives. and i was like, mother, where have you been for two years? but for the first time she said, i why these books are important and it's for me. and i wouldn't read, but that doesn't mean it doesn't mean to be there because it might need to be there for somebody else. so yeah, my mom, she's. yeah. asked me tomorrow might be a different we're like we're like the oil and vinegar so you mentioned i'm being scared at one point are there still moments when you feel scared but do you have that fear of the unknown. yes i, i it's still happening. one of the men, the extremist, posted my online two weeks ago. yeah. he went on this weird ten minute video blog thing about me

connecting. me to like this organisé. i don't know what it's like. it doesn't make sense. i've stopped trying to figure it out and on desk was a picture, a framed photo. me because that's not concerning or anything. so as he's displaying a picture of me proudly on his desk and then in the video and giving my address, you know, it just i don't go out anymore in my town don't go out to eat. i, i get my groceries delivered. i live in a small town with two red lights. so if i go out. i'm going to see everybody in their mama. that's what always say, you know, i don't go out in my community anymore. sometimes have to, though, parent nights at school where i work. but my daughter is 17 and she's in the band. she was 15 when this started. so what you do on a friday night, the football team and the band plays. so if i go, if i want to go, my child, i have to sit in the stands. people call me pedophile and

groomer people follow me around, record me, take my picture to post awful things about me. and i live in that. they're going to say these things in front of child and they have we've gone dress shopping at the local little boutique and. my daughter realized everyone was staring and making ugly comments and she started crying and said, can we please leave for a speech i gave at the public library? i well, i guess it's not just that because i refuse to be silent now, i about everything, you know, i'm talking about all the books, but, you know, i'm scared. i have every two months when i go to speak at the public library board meeting, i have to travel miles through wooded roads. i, i concealed carry. i sleep with a shotgun under my bed. we got cameras installed. i a dash cam. i am in fear for my life and

it's not, you know. oh, that's no it's these people are obsessed me and it's it's very scary and they the people that are behind us are people in positions of power and the dark money nonprofit. so yeah, there's and they're backed, you know, by our governor. so yeah, there's it's i have a reason to be scared. they're not they're still not going to silence me. they're so right. and so you you mentioned in remember in the back room, i said i had a couple moments. it says, what did it feel like when organizations derogatory comments about you and what you stand for. and you mentioned that at one point all of these organizations started popping up like on a teenager or something like that it was i said all the organizations, all the negative like. how did that feel for you in and you've already mentioned that

that can that is continuing but how did that yeah it's like a virus a stomach virus and they all catch it and they all just want to regurgitate the everything. hey, they're all over the place. it's like, you know, yeah, mom's for liberty. tweeted, i was a grandma. the national moms for liberty that has, what, million or so followers. cheer. i check lipstick, talk. who you know, tweeted about me. i but you know it's not those don't bother me as much as the local people the person i taught down the hall from for ten years, my my child's best friend's father is saying because at point they were selling that had my face lasered into it that said librarian tears they sold them and and my

my child her best friend's dad said i got get me one of those how do i explain that to my child your best friend's dad is a a-hole like i can't you know it's you know it's harder when it's people you know and people you expect act better of. so it's it's the close the home people that that are the most upsetting. so you've answered the next few question so so talk let's talk a little bit about the people who actually supported. yes, i'll tell you, it's it's first of all, the school librarians from the get go had my had my back. stacy in the group chat and all of them. and then school i brands across the country i noticed school librarians public academic librarians. the president of the american library association at the time

called me personally, didn't know her, called me personally to check on me. i mean, she got my cell phone number. i don't care because i needed to hear, you know, how like she was so supportive of me. what can i do to help all of the the past current and the future at the time american association of school librarians, presidents, all four of them called me personally. what do you need? students? i have a 24 year educator. when i started teaching, you know, i taught 13 to 14 year olds at the time. so they're in their mid thirties now and a lot of those students, former in their late twenties, early thirties reached out to me and i said i say this often that it's kind of like my it's a wonderful life moment that even though there's been such hate, the and people saying you made a difference to me i had you know i talk about some of them in the book i will say gen z army came

out and full force when i those those kids that are and they're not they're early twenties they started trying to get on social media like you know i'll talk about my teacher you know and but i've had you know, i had a student and i write about the student named sean who lived in minnesota that heard me on npr formula and said, miss jones, i heard you on npr. i recognize your voice immediately. i know you don't remember me, but name is sean and blah blah blah blah. and i was i wrote back, well, yes, sean i remember you. you're in fourth hour. i remember you sat two years prior to that. i taught your brother dylan. remember where he sat? he was in my sixth hour there in their late 20 early thirties because. when they're your kids, they're your kids for life. and he he said, remember we took that lesson to remember we did this. and your then dad outshines the every death threat.

you know that's that's yeah you and i'll i'll say sean's in minnesota he's still in minnesota and i'm so proud of him he's married and he has really great job. his brother came my book launch. his brother went to rutgers and got his master's in education is now teaching in baton rouge and came to my book client and he said and i was miss mckee even as i made it i this mickey rooney and i'm like yes i said i even wrote about it my book when your brother reached out to me because his mom came to and she's like, you know, i just i'm so i'm so thankful that you taught my boys and you just can't take that away from me no matter how hateful people are. all they have is their hate. i have thousands. i counted it up one day. i've taught over 8000 students. you know know, and it if at least you know one of them.

i changed that's more than these people they don't have that i feel for them so and so you've you've offered a lot of support to students. well, excuse me you taught a lot of students and i know like you have a lot colleagues who actually you really inspire them. do you find that people reach out you often? yes i you know, because we've each other for years, you know, i kind of i had so many people i learned from when i was starting out as a school librarian. so like i tried to turn around and offer it back to everybody else. and i think we should lift each other up, you know, like we should all help each other. so if stacy tells me she wants to, you know, maybe join this or run for this or whatever, i'm going to be there for her. and so, you know, i try because people did that for me and i try

to turn it around and try to give back and i don't know that i'll ever be able to repay everyone that's given me so much so, but i'll always try the librarian world is the library world in general is fiercely loyal. but i also learned in this past two years that we're kind of bad. so yeah, and we a lot. i mean, i think that's just that the world of being an educator in general. however, we do share a lot. so i have a few more things because we're to run out of time and we have some coming up. i'm you mentioned a lot about i'm media so i have a few i'm going to give you starter sentences and ask to finish that. okay. social media has been a blessing and a curse. you can you can use it to push false information.

hey. or you can use it like what i've been doing to push the truth about libraries and to build coalitions to combat this absolute. here's another one standing up for censorship has been the thing to do. and i wouldn't change a thing about it. absolutely. and if i had an opportunity, start over, i would change not a thing. yeah, i wouldn't change anything. i mean, that's not don't get me wrong. it sucks. i don't want to go through that again. i don't want to go through that. but i, i want to change it in order to escape what happened to me. i want to change anything. so, yeah, the, the book itself is, is definitely a wonderful tell all. i think that the the way you your story as well as there are parts that school librarian can

relate to at some point in time in there i think that it's inspiration personal i think you touch on emotional issues that several librarians felt over time but i also think that people in our world and hopefully in the world in general disrespect to a different way because you decided to step out and be courageous and brave. so in closing, my last question is who is amanda jones. oh, i'm for the word. oh, accomplice, because am not. i'm going to be accomplice for. is that the word? i'm trying to think if somebody said it, it's not an activist, it's not an advocate it. you go even farther and you become an in the good trouble, you know. so that's why i'm trying to be

for the greater good, you know, excellent. and i'll tell you, it it wasn't hard at all like was online searching these questions. so and i'm like, screw this. i just started typing because i had read the book and i knew who you were, but i wanted to give the audience information like questions that you all may have. i wanted some of those questions to be answered because i've heard this stuff from you but the book really opened my eyes and inspired me and just just gave me some reinforcement on exactly functioning because, my goodness, like all the things you endured throughout the book, the way you shared the information and the way that you were, there were a lot of vulnerable moments there and and i just wanted to say thank you for that. thank you for sharing. you're welcome. you know i kind of buried it all

there. i even talk about how i am. i'm very uncomfortable about race, but we better have we have to, you know, and i, i talked my family and the way grew up and my views now and it's uncomfortable all in the house. but we have to be uncomfortable and move. you learn and grow and so the book is, you know it's a it's my story, what happened to me. but it also touches on what's happening to several librarians across. the country it talks about. explain to libraries, to people that don't understand of the policies that we already have, protect children. and then it talks about hate and hate rhetoric and politicians and why this is happening. and then it ends on a good note with me returning, it's i took a medical leave of absence. so the book ends from returning back to school, which was last year. and it and it gives people several tips on what to see if it's happening in their

community or how to help others that. i hope people take away from it that aren't, you know, librarians that are just that are moms, dads, grandparents, uncles, citizens who love libraries and who love reading and want to protect our first amendment. thank you, amanda. know you're. and so now it's time for audience to ask some questions. so if you have a question, you can come the mic. i'm currently at the mic, the far side of the auditorium where my colleague is at and we will go one after another until top of the hour. so don't be shy. we'll let i have also multiple ala a cell functions would lock us up together. okay yes. thank you for speaking to today and for all have done have you

figured because you said many talked at that original meeting why you were targeted specifically it was just you were the most uppity woman there. was it you know, have you figured that out? i mean, i have my suspicions. i have my suspicion. i went dressed like a suit type. i was dressed up more than everybody else. i say that i was the 20, 21, national librarian, scholar burn of the year and that i was at the time the current president of the louisiana associate school librarians because i wanted to people to know that when i was talking policy, i knew what i was talking about. and i think what they thought happen was that they would target most outspoken or who they thought would be the most outspoken, and that if they could silence me, they can silence everyone. and it did work because when they i mean they didn't silence

me, but they scared everybody and nobody went to the next couple of meetings. they were scared, but they messed with the wrong one and they were not prepared. and so they did not choose their victim very. thank you. you're welcome. hi thank you so much for speaking today. this has been really edgy. the decision to at your school at, your house, i'm sure, was a very hard decision to make. but i'm curious, why did you choose to stay or more specifically, why did you choose to not leave. it was not hard for me, and i never gave it a second thought because lived there my entire life and. it's my town. and they're not they're not i'm not. you know i'm not a quitter, but it's my town and i'll -- if they're going to run me out of my own town. but everybody has me that everything.

everybody does. yeah yeah. hi. my name's kristen. i'm a reporter with the baltimore banner and i have covered a lot of the book burning happening in a county not too far away from here. carroll county, i believe you mentioned utilizing your local news coverage. and i'm wondering if you could talk about what that coverage like and if you think it helped or hurt, it depends on who's covering it, because we had some of the local television reporters, it was some of the laziest i've ever seen in my life. and they just told one side and sensationalized it. but you had the print reporters that were doing the work and they were linking sources and agendas and they were this what really happened. so that was great. but the people, my community look, they looked at what they

could see, which was not. and i refused to speak to the the television media, but i spoke to every print reporter and but you have to you have to you have to put it on public. people are going to read about this like 20, 30, 50 years. i want to document what we did. you know, so print, print all the way. me. hi, amanda. my name is denise. and first i want to say is, is know my christian sister and joshua one nine tells you to please strong and courageous and i just want to encourage you to continue to god's grace and god's power to support your your effort and in your book. secondly, i've raised two daughters, beautiful daughters. 24 and 29 now. and were raised in this library.

both had library cards at the of three. so i love love love and libraries and they were both strong and you know i had a dream for my my girls or it to come to fruition the the oldest one the 29 she works for microsoft and the other one just graduated from from albright and on mother's day this year and the oldest one received her master's from carnegie university. so all from the library that were awesome librarians that we met along the way in the books that that that i encourage them to read as a mother. my third question is for in regards to your daughter in regards to all of this crazy ness and madness because i'm kind of going through similar at this particular time, the peer pressure that was placed on her. i'm just curious, as you can speak, on how did it did it

create division? because you're in the high school she's you say she's 17 and you're in high. and that's where you that the most. i mean i went through some with my girls but we was able to trust god in this situation. but i'm just curious as to did it created create any division in your household or in to the her other classmates and attacking her because of what's going on and do she your book so. that's a good question because i had it affected had my child been targeted too i would had to have taken a step back for her. the thing about my daughter is i mentioned earlier that she's a band and i don't know how bands are school bands around here, but in louisiana they're like tight knit families. and i'll say this community was spewing a lot of hate, but the kids are okay the kids are more inclusive and, empathetic people.

and the kids that are in tend to be in the band, in our community are the. there's a lot of members of the communities that i was trying to protect. so they love me. so she love and her principal the good thing about living in a community where you know her principal the people like they taught me they knew me they were people that watched out for her had had she been by her own peers. and now we we had might not be as outspoken today. but now she's been fine. she care less, actually, about my book she went to the book launch and was like, can we go now? so she's 17. so you know that too. yeah. she's just she's just texted me. when are you gonna be home? i need i need some money. i go. i'm like, your dad's right next to you. i. oh, yeah, she's fine. she's fine. yes. thank you.

hi, how are you? i'm i'm a library media specialist in county. i this is my 29th year in education, seventh year in the library. i have been part of several reconciliations. my recommendation book selection committees and i think as in marilyn, we feel like we are safe. you know or a little more safe than other states. but i see that you know each year it gets a little closer to texas, to louisiana and to florida because there are so there's this can, you know, organizations that's trying to change the narrative of the freedom to read. so my question is, before gets to that point where we're at you know at louisiana, we're in florida, we're in texas where laws are threatening our lives and threatening our job and threatening our livelihoods. what we do now so that we are

protecting ourselves, knowing it is at a place. it's happening. it's coming. i was coming. yes. so what do we do as? a state that's pretty liberal that where we when we do have these review committees were actually winning. we're actually, you know, allowing books to stay made. but it could change. yeah and yeah. so just that's that's a really good question. and i talk a lot, so i write a lot of my book about building an alliance, a public library or a school or like a library alliance in your county and start getting out the good word about libraries and pushing that. but having a coalition already so that when it does arise you already have steps like you've already built a you know you've gotten 910 parents community members together that says if this happens going to do this and you formulate a plan before happens. i just wrote it an essay for time magazine about 2 to 3 weeks

ago that attacks on our libraries are really going hinge on this presidential election because you'll see we have one kid i like to get too political. it is it's become a political issue. we have one candidate who is getting up at rallies and spewing that. they're trying to put sexually explicit material in the toddler libraries, which is not a thing that is doing. and then you have another vice presidential candidate who's signed anti book banning laws in his state as governor in this this election is important and we have to vote because if one person gets in it's going be like this for libraries for another a long time and i just want amy stacey is one of our advocates she the best she's in a group chat with me to see. she's the best she really has so we've got time for two last questions we'll get the mail out. the first one go right now.

i did two questions, but one of my questions you just answered, as you know, several major trade publishers just sued and won court cases against school districts in florida. do you see that happening and what role do you think? major trade publishers can play in preventing sue as censorship in both public and school libraries? it's very important that they that that's i because for a while there was just penguin random house and i a friend of i even talked about writing an article called send in the cavalry like one of the rest of you had to join my come on now. but i'm happy to see that in florida and texas all of the top five have joined now i'm including my own public i'm so thankful and so because the grassroots alliance is that we build they're great in at the local level but we have no money. we cannot file lawsuits.

so is a major win in florida this week and then coming in two weeks our next week september fourth. there's a huge case called leila green. leila little green versus l.a. texas. it's going to be in the fifth circuit, which is it's a texas court case, but it's happening in new in the fifth circuit that's going to determine it's going to be huge for censorship and public libraries. it's in public it's going to take these big corporate nations, these big publishing companies to put their money behind their authors in their books and the citizens in the libraries. i also wish, though, that the library supply companies would join in because if there's no libraries, are they going to supply? so we're working on that, they're thanks, amanda, for writing your book. i think you just sort of answer my know lead into my next question. you know we talked about like the censorship flow school libraries and it's gone down to the public libraries and what's the next step, you know, whether it's like the publishing houses,