Mick Hartley

No surprise here. From the Telegraph:

Gender-critical books have been hidden from view at public libraries by “tinpot censors” working for a Labour council, The Telegraph can reveal.

Works by authors sceptical of transgender activism became the subject of an internal “grievance” within the library service of Calderdale Council, a local authority affiliated with the controversial LGBT charity Stonewall.

The Telegraph can reveal that books critical of gender ideology have been removed from public view by staff at council libraries, and stashed out of sight in an off-limits storage space.

Library services, overseen by a Labour councillor who has faced calls to resign after speaking at a pro-Palestine rally supporting a wanted terrorist, have hidden a book warning of the dangers of puberty blockers and gender reassignment surgery.

Titles concealed from the public also include books by Kathleen Stock and Helen Joyce and which critique the view that humans can become men or women based on how they identify.

Well, "critique" is one way of putting it. They point out, quite rightly, that people can't change sex.

After learning that her book had been concealed, Ms Joyce said: “You have to deal with little tinpot censors. “They think it’s incumbent upon them to educate those they think of as racists, homophobes, colonialists, and transphobes.

“They think it’s their job to educate people about all this.

“They live in a bubble which allows them to do and say sanctimonious and stupid things and feel that they are in the right.”

Calderdale Council has stated that no books are expressly banned by library services, but information from the local authority has revealed that “following consideration of a formal grievance internally” a number of titles were “placed in the lending store”.

The council has confirmed that while these books could be found in the catalogue and specifically requested by the public, they “are not visible on our library shelves”.

The books removed from public view are all critical of gender ideology and transgender activism, and include Ms Joyce’s Trans and Prof Stock’s Material Girls, bestselling titles which argue that biological sex is immutable and not altered by self-identification.

I very much doubt that Calderdale libraries are the only ones guilty of removing or hiding gender-critical books. The same also happens in bookshops, where, in Waterstones at least, gender-critical books are impossible to find, while books like Shon Faye's The Transgender Issue ("Monumental – crystal clear in its understanding of how the world should be" – Judith Butler) are prominently displayed and "highly recommended".