- Free speech is under assault in educational settings, school committees, university boards, and political rallies across the United States.

Today's guest warns the danger isn't just about our access to books and ideas, but to the fundamental human rights and political freedoms we all hold dear.

She's Suzanne Nossel, this week on "Story in the Public Square."

(uplifting music) (uplifting music continues) Hello, and welcome to "Story in the Public Square," where storytelling meets public affairs.

I'm Jim Ludes from the Pell Center at Salve Regina University.

- And I'm G. Wayne Miller, also with Salve's Pell Center.

- And our guest this week is Suzanne Nossel, the Chief Executive Officer of PEN America, and the author of the book, "Dare to Speak, Defending Free Speech for All."

She joins us today from New York.

Suzanne, thank you so much for being with us.

- Thanks for having me, happy New Year.

- I've been a great admirer of you and your work and the work of PEN America for years.

For the audience at home who maybe might not be familiar with PEN America, can you tell us what you do?

- Sure, we are an organization with a mission to both celebrate and defend freedom of expression worldwide.

We work with writers.

We're a membership organization of writers, and we do a literary festival.

We give out awards, we have programs to enable lesser-heard voices to make themselves heard on the national scene, whether it's incarcerated writers or young undocumented dreamers or others locked out of the literary community.

And then we have a very robust advocacy arm that works both around the world and here in the United States to combat threats to free expression through research, advocacy, public campaigning, and the mobilization of our members.

We have an office in Washington, one in Los Angeles, a brand new one in Miami, Florida that we just opened up and our headquarters are here in New York City.

- Well, I think it's that advocacy piece that I found so compelling, and have for some time.

The freedom to write, or in some cases, even the freedom to read, why is that so important?

- Look, it is the lifeblood of a democracy and a flourishing society.

People need to be able to gain information, to follow their curiosity, to distill the truth, separate fact from falsehood.

And that depends on the freedom to speak, to write, to think as you see fit.

And we protect that here in the United States under the First Amendment.

It's protected around the globe under international human rights law.

And it's recognized as a bedrock of so many societal goods that we take for granted, whether it's being a catalyst to scientific progress and innovation, a enabler of functional public policy where we can have a vigorous debate and decide what is the best direction for our communities or our society at large.

It's a source of inspiration.

People being able to follow their own creativity, create great art, great film, great novels.

All of that is sort of undergirded by freedom of expression.

And also importantly, the ability to wage movements for social change, whether it's women's rights or climate justice or immigrants rights, environmental protection, all of those movements sort of sit on the foundation of free expression rights, the right to challenge what government is doing, to expose the role of corporations, to put forward demands.

If free speech and the freedom to write is not protected, all of that can be impaired.

And we see that around the world, whether in China or Iran or other repressive societies, that those freedoms are not upheld and people cannot speak their mind, they can't drive for social change.

And so that's why for us this such a core part of our mission and something that we're dedicated to each day.

- Your work seems more urgent now, perhaps, than ever.

And turning to the United States now, what is behind the growing number of book bans and censorships?

what are the factors at play here at the beginning of 2024?

- Yeah, look, we have seen a rash of book bans across the country.

Book banning is an issue that PEN has worked on for decades.

Our organization's actually 100 years old, believe it or not, but we would deal with a few book bans a year.

There'd be a librarian or parent somewhere in the country who would object to a book.

We'd usually write a letter, the book would be put back on the shelves, and that was it.

And what we saw beginning about two-and-a-half years ago was that this became a weapon of choice in our culture wars.

And it grew out of a couple of different factors.

One was sort of post-COVID tension between schools and teachers and parents.

People were frustrated by learning losses and disruptions during the pandemic, and the bond of trust between families and schools was broken.

And so that was one underlying contributor.

And then we have this phenomenon of a sense among some Americans that the pace of social change is moving too quickly.

Whether it's on racial justice issues or the role of transgender individuals in our society, that things are changing too fast, that we're maybe moving in directions that turn their back on what people see as traditional American values or the way that they grew up.

And so a lot of the backlash against books is overwhelmingly targeting books by and about authors and stories of color or LGBTQ narratives.

And that really is a reaction to sort of this sense that kids are being taught ideas that their parents may not be comfortable with.

But what has happened, kind of the third element that's essential to understand, is that this is not a phenomenon of parents kind of picking up the backpack and opening it and seeing, "Oh, there's a book that doesn't seem right for my 8-year-old.

It's a preteen book."

That's not what this is.

This is an organized movement of activists around the country who are trying to galvanize parents to push back against the school system.

Some of them are motivated by a desire to put public education to an end, to move our country entirely to a voucher system where people can go to religious schools and private schools and just cash in their portion of the public fist to underwrite whatever kind of education they want for their children.

And so they have seized on these books, some of which are explicit, especially the books for teenagers.

They're books that are dealing with issues of sexuality or gender identity that are not right for younger kids, but the authors know that, and the publishers know that.

No one is introducing those books at the middle school level.

That's not what this is about.

And we hear repeatedly from teachers and librarians, and parents and students for that matter, that for some kids these books can be real lifesavers.

But they are sort of lightning rods in certain communities, and there are activists who have picked up on that and sort of recognize that this is a powerful wedge issue and a way of sowing conflict.

And what's astonishing is that in, and I think the state of Florida, less than about two a dozen parents and citizens who accounted for the banning of over 1,000 books.

So overwhelmingly, this is the work of isolated individuals.

And in some of these communities, all it takes is for one person to lodge an objection and the book gets withdrawn across, it can be a county that serves 20,000 students.

And so this is not about parental rights, this is about the rights of a handful of people being asserted against those of the great majority.

- So in a report from the end of 2023 titled, "Spineless Shelves," PEN America reported that in the two school years spanning July, 2021 to June, 2023, you identified almost 6,000 instances of book bans across 41 states and 247 public school districts affecting almost 3,000 authors, illustrators and translators.

First question there, and this again is a huge topic, what kinds of books, in a little more detail than you already already gave, are being banned?

- Yeah, look, overwhelmingly it is books that deal in some way with issues of race and ethnicity or those that deal with LGBTQ identities.

But we've also seen sort of swept up in these bans many classics, books like "The Grapes of Wrath" or "To Kill A Mockingbird" that maybe have a scene or two that is sexually explicit or it'd be inappropriate for certain age ranges.

And that becomes the excuse to ban the entire book.

And so looking at what's on the list of the most banned books, there are some that are for more mature students that deal with contentious and sensitive topics that some parents may be uncomfortable with, but that, again, for some students, are absolutely necessary, can be a real lifeline.

For example, for a student who is isolated in a community where their gender identity or expression or sexual orientation is rejected, they can't talk to their teachers, they can't talk to their parents, they feel so alone, and then they find this book on the shelf and realize, "Look, there's a wider world out there.

There are people like me, there's a future for me."

So those are some of the books.

But then we see all kinds of things.

I mean, biographies of people like Ruby Bridges or the baseball player Roberto Clemente getting swept up in these bans.

Why is that happening?

It's because this is not about parents opening up the book and saying, "Hey, there's something wrong with it."

This is about lists of books.

In some cases we've seen lists of books that have been created to help libraries offer a more diverse selection of books and more representative set of characters and narratives to their students.

And that list of books for diversity and inclusion has been ported wholesale to become a list of books that ought to be banned and that are put up for banning and for challenge in those school systems.

So it's a very blunderbuss effort.

And so many of the books on the list are just astonishing to us.

We sort of find out every day, whether it's Art Spiegelman's "Maus," or a new announcement of Sheryl Sandberg's book about grief being banned.

It is just astonishing what is being swept up.

- Suzanne, getting ready for this interview, I spent a little time looking at some of the reports that PEN America's put out.

And even just last night, you documented 700 books that had been banned by Orange County, Florida public schools since the start of this academic year.

Books like "Earth," the book by Jon Stewart.

"Yes, Please," by Amy Poehler.

You mentioned the book by Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant.

"Angels and Demons" by Dan Brown, which are in some respects popular, current, contemporary accounts by comedians, business leaders, novelists.

But there are also some real literary works here, "The Bondswoman's Narrative" by Hannah Crafts, the first documented book by an African American woman.

Others by Margaret Atwood, Stephen King, Cormac McCarthy, Joyce Carol Oates.

Can you speak to sort of the deeper questions of academic integrity, freedom of speech, freedom of thought that we compromise when we start banning important literary works?

- Yeah, absolutely.

Look, Toni Morrison's "The Bluest Eyes," one of the most banned books, I mean, it's a difficult book, it can be distressing to read that, but that's what literature is for.

It's to challenge us.

It's to force us to think about lives that are unlike our own, to probe the depths of humanity and what people are capable of, all those amazing things that we get from reading a work of great literature.

To question our assumptions and our values and develop our sense of morality and ethics, but guided by literature.

And so to excise books to send the message that books are dangerous is, I think in itself, dangerous to the role of our public schools as an underpinning of democracy.

I mean, these are the places where students learn to grapple with difference.

They learn about identities unlike their own.

They learn how to analyze and think more deeply.

Literature is unique as an art form in that unlike film or television or really anything else, the theater, it puts you inside the head of a character, where it's almost like you're seeing the world through their eyes in a very personal way.

And literature in so doing unlocks empathy, it allows us to see the world from a perspective of someone unlike ourself and perhaps to open our eyes to how we're behaving, to what the power dynamics are in society.

And so to curtail that, to put that off limits, to circumscribe what kids can read, we've heard from kids who say this really undercuts their love of reading.

They're curious about certain things.

They want to follow those passions.

In some communities they've actually shuttered the school library or emptied the classroom shelves entirely of books for fear of what is gonna trip wire these censors and make them come after teachers and librarians.

Because the approaches are very often punitive, where there are legislative mandates in certain states that underpin these book bans.

And if you fall afoul of them, you can get into real trouble.

And so educators are erring on the side of caution and depriving kids of books entirely.

So it's a very disturbing trend.

It's counter majoritarian, it's anti-intellectual, it's undermining of the role of our public schools.

And that's why it's been so important to us to be at the forefront of fighting back.

And that's why we just opened that office in Florida.

- Well, and I was gonna ask you about the geography of this.

Is this really a national phenomena or do we see it concentrated in certain parts of the country?

- It's concentrated in certain parts of the country.

Florida's the number one state for book banning.

Not too far behind is Texas.

And then we see places like Utah and Idaho.

But there are pockets, you'd be surprised.

Here in New York State, in California, more conservative districts that have gotten onto this bandwagon that have been reached by these activists.

And there are some also book bans that emanate from the left.

In Burbank, California, they've banned any book that makes reference, spells out the "N" word fully.

And that includes things like James Baldwin and "Huckleberry Finn."

And we push back equally against that.

Those are important works of literature that need to be accessible and read.

- I don't know if you can speak in detail about Stephen King.

He's been very, very active and upfront in this movement, meaning don't ban books.

He has been a bestselling author for decades and decades and decades.

Why now would his books be targeted and do you know what is in them that people find offensive?

I mean, he's a horror writer.

So anyway, I wonder if you can give us a little- - It's part of this wave, it's part of this movement.

It has very little to do with anything in any of the individual books.

It can be something as simple as a sex scene or the depiction of a character in terms that somebody has judged to be sort of tendentious on the basis of race or to promote a kind of racial ideology that they disagree with.

So trying to find a legitimate basis for these bans, I think, is an exercise in futility.

It's a blunderbuss effort to exert control, to push back, to try to reinforce a sort of traditionalism that excludes all kinds of challenging literature.

And when it's a famous author like Stephen King, we hear about it, but the consequences for lesser known authors are really grave.

I mean, for many of them they depend on school and bookstore visits to make a living.

There are a lot of authors who are just getting their start.

They're authors from communities, authors Black and Latino and LGNTQ authors for whom this is a real blow to their careers.

And so a lot of people sort of think if your book is banned, that's gonna fuel sales and you get all the publicity.

And that is true when it comes to big name authors to some degree.

But many and even most of the authors who are caught up in this are not in that position.

- Can you talk about the role and the position that librarians both in schools and in public libraries are placed?

- Yeah, sure.

Look, these are professionals who've been trained on how to select and curate these collections.

And librarians make judgements every day about what belongs on the shelves, what books are out of date, what books no longer hold great interest.

They have to cull and update their collections.

And there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.

What we consider a book ban is when someone raises an objection on viewpoint-based or ideological or content-based grounds and wants to override the decisions of those librarians or educators.

And when political bodies insert themselves into that process where legislators are trying to dictate that what librarians have decided belongs on the shelves can no longer be made available there.

And it puts librarians in a very difficult position.

We've seen people leaving the profession, librarians who are fired and disciplined for trying to push back against censorious restrictions.

And librarians are really on the firing line.

I mean, it's not something you think of ordinarily.

I remember thinking of it always as kind of a quiet profession, but librarians have had to be very outspoken in pushing back against this and defending the freedom to read, which is really, it's a bedrock value for them and they're very passionate about it.

I've been myself quite inspired by getting to know some of the librarians at the forefront of this.

- Yeah, Suzanne, I know that there's a danger in reasoning by historical analogy, but I can't think about book bans without also thinking about Nazi Germany and all the images of books being gathered, collected, and often burned.

Have the good guys in history ever been the ones banning books?

- Not that I know of.

I mean, I think that impulse that ideas are dangerous and that you want to afford someone in a position of authority, whether it's a governor or a legislator or a superintendent, the power to decide what books and what narratives can be suppressed and denied and buried, I think that's dangerous.

The First Amendment protects freedom of speech on the premise that we're just better off even when ideas may be objectionable, noxious, that the best answer is to rebut them with better ideas and counter narratives and refutations, rather than trying to muzzle and suppress.

And I think it's because we recognize that if we give those in positions of authority the power to more aggressively police speech, that on balance, they're gonna use that power in self-serving ways.

And that's what we saw in Nazi Germany.

What books are they banning?

Is it ones that are a real danger to the people?

No, it's books that contradict their narrative, their assertion of power that they think may stand in the way of their ascent.

And it's not dissimilar here.

You have ideologically-motivated activists who have a certain worldview and are trying to shut out anything which runs counter to that.

- That's kind of terrifying.

So let's change course here just for a second and talk about free speech on campus.

The rise of antisemitism across the United States, I think, has been well documented and warned in a lot of different places.

We've seen since the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel an increase in campus activism and conflicts over free speech, both by people who are alarmed by Israel's response to the attacks of October 7th, but also people who are frankly engaging in antisemitism or speech that actually seems to threaten others and their identities.

You've argued that there's a false choice that university administrators have been making between protecting free speech and protecting their communities.

What is that middle way that sort of speaks to all of those equities?

- Yeah, look, we believe very strongly at PEN America that the campus must be kept open both to all people and to all ideas.

And that there is a lot more that campuses need to do to create inclusive and diverse environments.

That is unfinished business.

A lot of progress has been made, but it remains incomplete.

And in many ways the campuses still resemble that which they were created as, in some cases, hundreds of years ago, which are places that were geared toward elite populations of white men.

Now you have a campus population that's much more diverse and that requires certain adaptations and adjustments to how the campus is run, how the classroom is run to ensure that everybody has a seat at the table, enough of a sense of belonging to feel like they can put up their hand and take part in a classroom discussion.

All that's necessary, but it need not and must not come at the expense of robust, uncompromising protections for free speech and academic freedom.

And we've spelled out in our work, in our reports, in my book "Dare to Speak, Defending Free Speech for All," in detail how these principles can be reconciled and why it is a false choice to suggest that you either protect diversity and inclusion or freedom of speech.

And yeah, there's a lot that needs to happen to allow these principles to cohabit.

A part of it has to do with how we exercise our free speech rights and the level of care and conscientiousness that we use with words.

It's also a matter of defending controversial speech, even if you disagree with it, respecting and defending the right to voice it.

Learning how to protest without silencing.

Powerful ways of making your point heard, objecting to what a speaker may have to say, but without shouting them down or silencing them in a way that interferes with their freedom of expression and also with the freedom of the audience to hear them out, if they so choose.

And so there is a lot that the university can do to enable these values that I think are mutually reinforcing to both thrive on campus.

Unfortunately, it's been neglected, and we have now a rising generation that increasingly seems to see free speech as a smokescreen for hatred.

Kids who have witnessed free speech principles being invoked only in relation to speech that they find offensive and who believe that if the price of creating diversity and inclusion involves the suppression of some speech, that that is worth it, that's a trade off that is worth it.

Which is an idea that we reject.

And so we do a lot of work with universities across the country and it's really skyrocketed in recent months on how to instill these principles, how to inculcate a culture of free speech and really how to universalize the place of free speech on campus so that every student when they enter the college classroom knows why free speech is protected, is prepared for some of the rough and tumble of encountering ideas that you may disagree with or find objectionable or that even may be upsetting to you.

And developing the resiliency to be able to contend with that.

And Israel-Hamas war has certainly thrown it for a loop.

You are used to people asking for protection from speech that was racially offensive.

Now you have people who are complaining about speech that is antisemitic or menacing on the basis of religion or nationality.

So in some ways, it's sort of tossed up the sides on this issue, and you have some people who maybe were the staunch free speech advocates who are now saying, "Wait, wait, wait, we might need some more protections."

Or others who said offensive speech should be banned or punished if it upsets someone who are now very vocal and speaking out themselves in ways that may cause upset among their classmates.

And so my hope is that this can be a watershed where people realize we have a shared stake in free speech principles, that, depending on the moment,.

somebody may be playing defense versus offense, but that these are values that underpin all of our ability to assert our ideas, to wage the movements, to study what we wanna study, to follow our curiosity.

- Suzanne Nossel, it's a great place to leave it.

The work is at PEN America.

We're so grateful to you for spending some time with us today.

That is all the time we have this week.

But if you wanna know more about "Story," you can find us on social media or visit pellcenter.org.

He's Wayne, I'm Jim asking you to join us again next time for more "Story in the Public Square."

(uplifting music) (uplifting music continues) (uplifting music continues) (upbeat music)