What's in a Label?

What's in a label? The head honcho of our library conglomerate is eradicating library labels. At first some may think okay, that could be a good thing - saving staff time and the library much needed funds. Then sanity steps in and smacks me a good one. WTF!!! For those who have never worked in a library you may not understand the severity of the situation. Mr. Big Cheese wants to turn the SoCal branch and all of her sisters into little (or big) souless hunks of uniformity. Think Walmart or Homedepot. Mr. Big Cheese wants to strip each branch of it's identity and it's soul. There's a reason our little SoCal Library has labeled certain materials the way we do. It's not to make more work- it is in fact to make things easier for both staff and patron. We didn't wake up one morning and say "gee.. let's label crap for the fun of it!" Our labeling system has evolved over years in response to the needs of our community. I shudder to think of what our ordered little library will become. This edict, if it passes will be a terrifiying blow to the running of the branch and staff morale. It's not like Mr. Big Cheese will reap the benefits of living in a labeless universe. It will be the peons, the troops in the trenches who will deal with the chaos of it all. How will our patrons find the mysteries??? the sci fi? or heavens, the new books? Dear God think about the shelf checks, the books from other branches that will find themselves on our shelves and vise versa because like a communist country everything looks the same. Creativity, orignality and pride will fall by the wayside and for what? To save a few measly staff hours from processing materials once they arrive at the branch? So that we, a government agency will resemble a cheap version of Borders? Mr. Big Cheese wants to be able to walk into any branch in our system and have it look the same. This is an unattanable dream and Mr Big Cheese won't be alive to witness this event. Why? Not because the Sisterhood of the Library Labels has put out a hit on him but because he doesn't want to unlable the existing materials. Oohh nooo this disordered chaos will grow like a malignant tumor on the backside of the library system, creating a mish mash of labeled and unlabeled materials until like a cancer it takes over the collection entirely. How long will it take? Perhaps a decade? I predict the fall out to be considerable due to misshelved items and disgruntled patrons. Dear Library Goddess this act of insanity offends my retentive soul!