This is the information hub for the Cosplay at the Council happening March 16th, 5PM at the Rutherford County Courthouse. Come at 4PM, otherwise it will be difficult or impossible to find seating and you will have to stand up the whole time, sit/stand outside of the main room, or leave. The meetings have been going long recently, around four hours. Please keep this in mind if you are planning to attend. I have suggestions further down for how to support the freedom to read if you don’t think you can stay for that long. It is suggested to eat something before, and to have a granola bar or something in the car for when the board takes a break.
Hello! The Library Council meets every month with some exceptions that are noted on their agenda for the year. The whole years meeting dates and locations have already been established.
If you can’t come in person because of scheduling or lack of childcare, we would love to see your support online! Here are some ideas on how to express support, and please tag or @ the Rutherford County Library System. I
*In your post, make sure you keep criticism directed towards the Library Board of Directors, not the System itself.
- Wear a shirt with your fav comic book or anime character, or make a clip of you dancing to your fav. anime song.
Linebaugh Library!
Hello to all those who believe in freedom!
I’m going to expand this section in a little bit.
I feel like a lot of the focus is on the constitutionality of the bans and on the people who’s jobs are affected by the bans,
and the people who are not able to access the books are left behind in the conversation.
Upcoming RuCo Library System Board Meetings
Mar. Board Meeting
March 16, 2026 — 4:00PM – 9:00PM
Meeting Location: Rutherford County Courthouse
Apr. Board Meeting
April 20, 2026 — 4:00PM – 9:00PM
Meeting Location: Rutherford County Courthouse
Jun. Board Meeting
June 1, 2026 — 4:00PM – 9:00PM
Meeting Location: City Council Chamber, Murfreesboro City Hall
How do the bans in RUCO County connect to increasing censorship from the US government?
The number of books that have been banned has escalated greatly in number and scale since 2020.
Spanning from 2001-2020, the religious groups dedicating their time to banning books were attempting to ban up to 46 titles a year; that number shot up to 4, 190 in 2024 according to data collected in the EveryLibrary Institute Report.
The people driving the bans are politically backed interest groups connected across the states, instead of singular concerned parents.
The list of books that was banned in one sitting on the ??? by the Rutherford county school system was the same list of books that Moms for Liberty in Florida wrote complaints against and advocated for the removal of in their local libraries.
The bans that were only happening in public schools and local libraries have spread to the federal level, with even colleges being threatened.
Add info about the Library of Congress, the army library, and the threats from the state against colleges, specifically MTSU, LAMBDA.
The local bans are erasing the same information that the federal bans are erasing, and more.
The school system has stated recent law passed by the Tennessee government called the “Appropriate materials act” that would remove “inappropriate material.” -add more info on it here- The Rutherford county school system used it to remove books that mention DEI characters. The Rutherford library system used an ordinance that has since been sued out of existence as their beginning reason to ban a book about a gay character from the library entirely, despite the county also adding a tiered member card system so children can’t check out books from the adult section. They’ve since created their own rules which they’ve also had to get rid of because of threats of a lawsuit from the ACLU, to ban informational books about transgender characters and sexual minorities geared towards children. The books are still missing from the shelves, and the book bans against transgender characters continue from the board.
Book Ban Breakers 