Mick Hartley

A new intervention in the National Library of Scotland farce:

Scotland’s national librarian is facing mounting pressure to reinstate a gender-critical book which she banned from a major exhibition, after a key donor joined a revolt against the move.

Alex Graham, who has given around £300,000 to the library, said he had been “shocked and angry” to learn that The Women Who Wouldn’t Wheesht had been excluded from an exhibit that he personally supported with a donation of about £20,000.

Graham, the creator of the television show Who Do You Think You Are, urged Amina Shah, Scotland’s chief librarian and the chief executive of the National Library of Scotland, to reverse her decision….

The critically acclaimed book, a collection of essays by more than 30 women about their role in the feminist campaign against Nicola Sturgeon’s gender self-ID law, was set to be included in its Dear Library exhibition, after it was nominated by several members of the public.

However, The Times revealed on Wednesday that it was pulled after a backlash by the library’s internal LGBT staff network, which claimed it contained “hate speech” and that displaying it would cause “severe harm” to workers.

They threatened to “notify LGBT+ partners of the library’s endorsement of the book” if management did not cave in….

In a major intervention, Graham called on the library to admit its mistake and reinstate the book to Dear Library, which Shah had publicly thanked him for his role in funding.

He said that if it did not, he would have no option but to publicly disassociate himself from the campaign, saying the library had given in to what he claimed was a “censorious, bullying culture” instead of standing up for ideals of free speech….

“I think this was a fundamental mistake and the correct thing for the library to do would be to put up their hands, admit that and reinstate the book,” Graham said. “Instead, there have been weaselly responses.

“The library is not saying they have taken it out because it contains hate speech, because it does not. They’ve taken it out because of some ill-conceived notion that someone might be upset by its presence. That’s not a good enough reason for me.”

Graham added: “This is not about taking one side or the other on the trans debate. It’s about the principles of open debate and free speech, which to the national library should be sacrosanct.

“It isn’t too late to redeem the situation. But if there is not a change of heart, I feel I will have no choice but to publicly dissociate myself from the exhibition and the campaign that surrounds it.

“This stupid escapade does not undo the very good work the library does, but it should never have happened.

“I couldn’t say definitely that I will not donate any more money if they stick to their guns on this, but it has certainly given me pause for thought. That makes me incredibly sad.”

It's always the same story – management running scared and caving in to the demands of their trans-fixed young staff.

“This book [The Women Who Wouldn’t Wheesht] was clearly selected to be included, and frankly the management were then bullied out of that by a staff lobby group.

“They say they’ve removed this book to protect relationships with stakeholders. But they certainly didn’t consult me and if they had, I would have voiced strong opposition. I am angry and disappointed at the decision to remove the book as well as the implication that as a stakeholder, I am somehow supportive of it, which I am not.”

Added: Jo Bartosch.

Once upon a time, the views of public servants such as librarians were both unknown and considered irrelevant. Professionalism meant separating the personal from the job. Now, thanks to social media’s culture of exhibitionism, the distinction between public and private has collapsed. Middle-class jobs in the cultural sector – which generally come with modest pay but high status – have become magnets for zealots whose main professional output seems to be policing the ideological hygiene of bookshelves and flaunting their lanyards.

The result is an arms race of censorship, in which public servants signal to their peers that they possess the approved views. What the public thinks – the great unwashed who actually fund these institutions – barely registers. If the staff at the National Library did not like the choices the Scottish people made, perhaps they should not have asked them in the first place.

Stop calling it ‘curation’. Call it what it is: censorship in the service of the cultural elite.