Librarians, I understand the impulse to focus on disinformation and information literacy in the wake of the capitol invasion, but I need your acknowledgment that white supremacy is the much more serious and urgent factor here.

The Capitol invaders did not show up and do what they did because they had poor information skills and were lied to. Although it’s true they have poor information skills and have been lied to.

They didn’t try and fail to learn the truth, they wanted to believe the lie. They are happy to have an explicitly racist President. They felt a right to storm the U.S. capitol. They demonize Black Lives Matter protests while waving the flag of treasonous Confederates inside.

They were able to storm the Capitol with almost none of them being shot, unlike Black people who get shot by police in their cars, their parks, their homes.

All of this is bigger than our profession or “information literacy.” If you want to work on a problem, you need to understand it first. Start with racism, not how to evaluate a website.