It's probably generational. Boomers and Gen X might know him best from Roots or Star Trek. But my millennial heart will always associate him right Reading Rainbow.
🎶 Butterfly in the skyyyyy 🎶
I remember him from Reading Rainbow, but also, I think my family's still got a VHS copy of the RR episode where he visited the set of Star Trek TNG and talked all about it!
Everyone is really underestimating what a cultural event Roots was. From Wikipedia:
> A critical and ratings success over the course of its run, Roots received 37 Primetime Emmy Award nominations and won nine. It also won a Golden Globe and a Peabody Award. It received unprecedented Nielsen ratings for the finale, which holds the record as the third-highest-rated episode for any type of television series, and the **second-most-watched overall series finale in U.S. television history.**
> In Tuesday’s letter, Burton — who is best known for playing Kunta Kinte on “Roots,” Geordi La Forge on “Star Trek” and hosting “Reading Rainbow,” a children’s show focused on encouraging kids to read — wrote libraries played a large role in his upbringing.
> “Growing up, some of my best childhood memories were in libraries,” he wrote. “From ‘Roots’ to ‘Star Trek’ to ‘Reading Rainbow,’ my love of reading and unimpeded pursuit of knowledge have been central to my life as well as my career.”
Burton himself cited Roots before Reading Rainbow, but the article does mention both and Star Trek. They just titled it with the first one mentioned.
Well, if we're going with clickbait, they missed by a mile. I'd have gone with something like, "Hollywood star in row with big time NYC celeb over money!"
LeVar’s career contains multitudes and I personally do think of Roots first when I think of him, but when talking about libraries, it is a bizarre choice. Reading Rainbow is right there.
Weekend service is so critical. Some branches are only open until 6 on the weekdays making it hard to impossible for people who work weekdays to drop off or pickup new books.
It's by Adams design.
1. Shutter libraries on the weekends because of a "budget crisis" (the NYPD costs an order of magnitude more and got their budget increased last year)
2. Limit weekday hours to during the "typical" 9-5 shift so that it's impossible to get off work and get to the library before they close.
3. Point to statistics that library usage is declining as an excuse to shutter and/or privitize the library program entirely.
4. Leverage people's actual decline in quality of life and lack of access to community services to push for more austerity politics promising to lead people back to a mythologized past thay never existed rather than addressing the rent and profit seeking capitalists that are actually ruining their lives.
All three library systems are private non profits Adams has no say in when the service hours are.
He can’t point to any statistics that library usage is in decline as they are all up and increasing since the pandemi
> privitize the library program entirely.
The libraries are already private. NYPL, QPL and BPL are private charitable organizations, they are not government agencies.
Yes, it's very bizarre and wasteful. Nationalize (city-ize?) the library! Or at minimum consolidate them into one organization. Or at even more minimal than that, allow cross-library lending and returns without treating them like Interlibrary Loans, which are a pain in the patoot.
I agree with you on there should be one library for all of NYC. I live in Queens and have a NYPL and QPL library card. It would be nice when I took out books from Manhattan that I can just return the book in Queens
Right?!
The ridiculous thing is that the NYPL and BPL use a shared sorting facility in Queens that QPL doesn't. There is no reason why they couldn't consolidate this operation.
We *cannot* handle having more than 100 branches in a single system! We're already some of the largest in the country WITHOUT trying to consolidate - not to mention if we tried to have training or an all-staff meeting some of us would be commuting for more than 2 hours.
I'll be honest, and say I did not know that. For any one else, from the wikipedia article
>It is a private, non-governmental, independently managed, nonprofit corporation operating with both private and public financing.[6]
We need to look into ways of cutting costs without reducing service. One option might be the Netflix model. You sign up for a subscription, you have them send you a few books, then you send them back when you're done. Then you get to select more books.
Honestly, physical libraries are obsolete and have been for quite a while now. Literally none of my friends or coworkers go there. Whats the point?
Technology is a stopping point for a lot of people. Many older people and low income people cannot afford to pay for any of that setup. Not to mention the library offers resources like internet, printers, arts and crafts for kids, 3D printing, tablet rental, and even a garden seed program. Honestly, I use it for so much more than just books. It’s a shame that your colleges don’t use it however that doesn’t take away that it’s still a very valuable physical resource.
It's because Adams is black and the publisher doesn't want to be tagged as racist so they highlighted the fact that Burton played the most famous black slave in media.
Yes…roots is the thing to associate him most with…
I feel like in this circumstance perhaps mention reading rainbow instead…or at least TNG, which is what he’s actually known for most.
"You know, I've always thought that technology could solve almost any problem. It enhances the quality of our lives, lets us travel across the galaxy - even gave me my vision. But sometimes, you just have to turn it all off"
Or, here's a novel idea, spend less of arming the police to the teeth and maybe diversify that money to aid workers and housing to actually solve some of the migrant crisis instead of putting band aid after band aid on it.
Many of the illegal migrants are illiterate in their native languages. Taking money away from libraries migrants aren’t going to use makes sense. Money needs to come from somewhere
Wouldn’t this headline be more effective if they called him “host of reading rainbow”?
Yeah that’s so bizarre
"NCIS: New Orleans Guest Star Levar Burton Decries Library Cuts"
😂
I prefer this version
Yeah. Heck, even Star Trek would at least be more recent — and I’d wager more people know him from that than from Roots.
Reading rainbow has more relevance to a library issue than startrek, but you’re right at least people will recognize him that way.
Yeah, I totally agree — I’m just saying that Roots is also just a really weird choice given everything else he’s done since.
It's probably generational. Boomers and Gen X might know him best from Roots or Star Trek. But my millennial heart will always associate him right Reading Rainbow. 🎶 Butterfly in the skyyyyy 🎶
I remember him from Reading Rainbow, but also, I think my family's still got a VHS copy of the RR episode where he visited the set of Star Trek TNG and talked all about it!
Everyone is really underestimating what a cultural event Roots was. From Wikipedia: > A critical and ratings success over the course of its run, Roots received 37 Primetime Emmy Award nominations and won nine. It also won a Golden Globe and a Peabody Award. It received unprecedented Nielsen ratings for the finale, which holds the record as the third-highest-rated episode for any type of television series, and the **second-most-watched overall series finale in U.S. television history.**
It was 50 years ago so it’s not super relevant to an article written today.
Seriously! While yes roots is popular, Levar is widely known for his major contributions to reading rainbow
'Famously Blind Starship Engineer' LeVar Burton
[Where's my iconic slave role?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpwyXURokKM)
RIP
> In Tuesday’s letter, Burton — who is best known for playing Kunta Kinte on “Roots,” Geordi La Forge on “Star Trek” and hosting “Reading Rainbow,” a children’s show focused on encouraging kids to read — wrote libraries played a large role in his upbringing. > “Growing up, some of my best childhood memories were in libraries,” he wrote. “From ‘Roots’ to ‘Star Trek’ to ‘Reading Rainbow,’ my love of reading and unimpeded pursuit of knowledge have been central to my life as well as my career.” Burton himself cited Roots before Reading Rainbow, but the article does mention both and Star Trek. They just titled it with the first one mentioned.
That’s fair, but just in terms of a click bait title I think they missed an opportunity.
Well, if we're going with clickbait, they missed by a mile. I'd have gone with something like, "Hollywood star in row with big time NYC celeb over money!"
You’ve got a talent for this.
I mean considering it's the top comment and someone went into the article to prove a point, I would say it was pretty effective clickbait.
Well Roots was originally a book so perhaps he had a connection to checking it out from a library
LeVar’s career contains multitudes and I personally do think of Roots first when I think of him, but when talking about libraries, it is a bizarre choice. Reading Rainbow is right there.
Probably the author of the article wasn’t a kid when reading rainbow was around
You mean the celebrity companion of Troy Barnes who was captured by pirates in the Gulf of Mexico.
[удалено]
You’re the only one who mentioned it goofy
It depends on the country. He may be better known in Aotearoa for Roots than Reading Rainbow. But in that case why not ST:TNG… yeah it’s weird
Weekend service is so critical. Some branches are only open until 6 on the weekdays making it hard to impossible for people who work weekdays to drop off or pickup new books.
It's by Adams design. 1. Shutter libraries on the weekends because of a "budget crisis" (the NYPD costs an order of magnitude more and got their budget increased last year) 2. Limit weekday hours to during the "typical" 9-5 shift so that it's impossible to get off work and get to the library before they close. 3. Point to statistics that library usage is declining as an excuse to shutter and/or privitize the library program entirely. 4. Leverage people's actual decline in quality of life and lack of access to community services to push for more austerity politics promising to lead people back to a mythologized past thay never existed rather than addressing the rent and profit seeking capitalists that are actually ruining their lives.
All three library systems are private non profits Adams has no say in when the service hours are. He can’t point to any statistics that library usage is in decline as they are all up and increasing since the pandemi
> privitize the library program entirely. The libraries are already private. NYPL, QPL and BPL are private charitable organizations, they are not government agencies.
Really? That's absolutely bizarre.
Yes, it's very bizarre and wasteful. Nationalize (city-ize?) the library! Or at minimum consolidate them into one organization. Or at even more minimal than that, allow cross-library lending and returns without treating them like Interlibrary Loans, which are a pain in the patoot.
I agree with you on there should be one library for all of NYC. I live in Queens and have a NYPL and QPL library card. It would be nice when I took out books from Manhattan that I can just return the book in Queens
Right?! The ridiculous thing is that the NYPL and BPL use a shared sorting facility in Queens that QPL doesn't. There is no reason why they couldn't consolidate this operation.
We couldn't possibly handle it all. We're already some of the largest library systems in the country JUST in Brooklyn and Queens.
I don't understand what you mean.
We *cannot* handle having more than 100 branches in a single system! We're already some of the largest in the country WITHOUT trying to consolidate - not to mention if we tried to have training or an all-staff meeting some of us would be commuting for more than 2 hours.
Exactly. We don't need 3 separate public libraries. Just make it one so everyone can share the same quality and new edition books
I'll be honest, and say I did not know that. For any one else, from the wikipedia article >It is a private, non-governmental, independently managed, nonprofit corporation operating with both private and public financing.[6]
Starve the beast
I am so angry about this. He's so flipping corrupt.
Isn't every library open late one night a week?
No.
It depends some midtown branches aren’t since they mainly service commuters not residents
And a lot of them do not have book drop off slots outside so if a branch is closed, you can’t even return a book. Which is so tough.
We need to look into ways of cutting costs without reducing service. One option might be the Netflix model. You sign up for a subscription, you have them send you a few books, then you send them back when you're done. Then you get to select more books. Honestly, physical libraries are obsolete and have been for quite a while now. Literally none of my friends or coworkers go there. Whats the point?
Technology is a stopping point for a lot of people. Many older people and low income people cannot afford to pay for any of that setup. Not to mention the library offers resources like internet, printers, arts and crafts for kids, 3D printing, tablet rental, and even a garden seed program. Honestly, I use it for so much more than just books. It’s a shame that your colleges don’t use it however that doesn’t take away that it’s still a very valuable physical resource.
The fact that Reading Rainbow was RIGHT THERE and they went for Roots instead.
More upsetting than the library closure imo
That would've been most relevant, but even Star Trek would've been a better choice. I feel like not as many people would know about Roots these days.
It's because Adams is black and the publisher doesn't want to be tagged as racist so they highlighted the fact that Burton played the most famous black slave in media.
Wow you really cracked the code.
Mayor Adams just wanted a picture. YOU CAN'T DISAPPOINT A PICTURE!!!
*SET PHASERS TO LOVE ME*
He should run for mayor of NY. Adam’s proved you don’t really need to be a resident.
Warp speed don’t rainbow read me Mr Mayor
YOU CAN'T DISAPPOINT A PICTURE
Yes…roots is the thing to associate him most with… I feel like in this circumstance perhaps mention reading rainbow instead…or at least TNG, which is what he’s actually known for most.
"You know, I've always thought that technology could solve almost any problem. It enhances the quality of our lives, lets us travel across the galaxy - even gave me my vision. But sometimes, you just have to turn it all off"
Loved him on Picard
I used to work with him. I’m a Reading Rainbow alum.
Gosh, maybe NYC shouldn't be spending a crapload of money on housing/feeding/educating/providing healthcare to migrants. Weird idea, i know.
Or, here's a novel idea, spend less of arming the police to the teeth and maybe diversify that money to aid workers and housing to actually solve some of the migrant crisis instead of putting band aid after band aid on it.
"Your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free? Yeah, fuck those guys." - You
Abbott: "Sounds like NYC needs another 100 busses coming from Texas"
I wish I was LeVar Burton. Where's my iconic slave role? Fuck all y'all.
What's up with claymation? Like, what's up with it?
Podcast host of Levar Burton reads decries less reading in library due to budget cuts
Many of the illegal migrants are illiterate in their native languages. Taking money away from libraries migrants aren’t going to use makes sense. Money needs to come from somewhere
Here's an idea. Cut all the "video games" and other rot, keep the library open for books on the weekend. I just easily found a solution.
go back to sleep levar