At least in previous centuries a trail of smoke loitered in the air after the censors were done burning books. The smell of information dying could not be escaped, nor could the haze be hidden.

In the digital era, information is deleted and edited by millions of invisible hands. Entire works of fiction are rewritten by publishing houses given custody of their survival, while historical records are misplaced if they invalidate the ‘current thing’. One wonders how much we have lost in the last 5 years…

These are dangerous times for knowledge.

Libraries are one of the few places where censorship can be seen in the flesh. Housing real books, their absence is conspicuous. This became the topic of conversation last week when parents in Canada were startled by a half-empty library in an Ontario school.

In a brazen fit of superior wisdom, books published before 2008 were removed to ensure the library remained ‘inclusive’.

Call me crazy, but it’s pretty ‘exclusive’ to cut down the history of human thought to the last 15-odd years of unremarkable publications.

Try to name of a great work published after 2008. No? That is probably because civilisation has been saturated by propaganda rather than talent. You are more likely to find illustrated rainbow pornography in the children’s section than a book on mathematics.

Described by staff at the school as ‘equity book-weeding’, parents fear it has left the library devoid of knowledge.

Historians would sell every organ in their body to magically recreate the lost libraries of Alexandria. The point of knowledge is to hoard it. That is what made civilisation smarter. The written word is a key indicator of success, as oral traditions are not enough to preserve knowledge. It is too easily lost, corrupted, forgotten, or misremembered. Civilisations without written texts failed to progress at the speed of their peers in the ancient world. Our historical kin understood this, which is why they built and revered libraries. Would Cleopatra have authorised the weeding out of dusty scrolls? As for our so-called modern civilisation, if it keeps deleting things it will suffer from amnesia.

The libraries of Alexandria were destroyed in stages, with a final record found in 642 AD after being captured by the Islamic forces of Amr ibn al-As. The destruction of the remaining scrolls was ordered by Caliph Omar who is said to have reasoned, ‘If those books are in agreement with the Quran, we have no need of them; and if these are opposed to the Quran, destroy them.’ It is a sentiment re-emerging within the jealous and inferior ideology of progressive thought.

In Canada, dismayed by the savage weeding, the Ontario Education Minister asked the school to stop chucking out books.

‘Ontario is committed to ensuring that the addition of new books better reflects the rich diversity of our communities. It is offensive, illogical, and counter-intuitive to remove books from years past that educate students on Canada’s history, antisemitism, or celebrated literary classics,’ said the Minister.

Oh well… At least the library’s books are donated and end up in the hands of someone who might learn something. No chance. According to CBC, ‘When it comes to disposing of the books that are weeded, the board documents say the resources are “causing harm”, either as a health hazard because of the condition of the book or because “they are not inclusive, culturally responsive, relevant, or accurate”. For those reasons, the documents say the books cannot be donated as “they are not suitable for any learners”.’ This has since been rectified.

Christopher Hitchens once asked in his famous lecture on free speech, ‘Who would you trust to make the decision about what you are allowed to read?’ The answer appears to be something along the lines of politically sensitive school boards and the education bureaucracy.

While it is unsurprising that such directives exist in 2023’s schooling environment, what is surprising is the silent obedience of those who carry out these orders.

The ‘weeding’ has since been described as a ‘miscommunication’. Would this slight backtrack have happened without the public outrage? Almost certainly not. Social media is increasingly being used to hold institutions to account.

Later, the board explained its focus on ‘safe’ and ‘inclusive’ material that is ‘culturally appropriate’ and viewed through the ‘right lens’. Which, as the rest of the world has been trying to explain, is the entire problem. This kind of political curation of a library is the opposite of diversity.

When asked if the board would replace the books which were thrown out, they said only that the shelves needed to be filled swiftly. Even when asked if Anne Frank’s diary would be returned, the answer was something about ‘if relevant to student learning about history’ which is a far cry from, ‘Of course – we are so sorry – that will never happen again – I am going to go out and buy that myself and personally put it on the shelf.’

It was only later, after a few train wreck interviews, that the following statement was released:

‘To be clear, books such as The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank and the Harry Potter series remain in our collections, and where needed, newer versions may be purchased if the book is in poor condition.’

Why was that so hard to say?

The idea of an ‘equity lens’ is a disturbing turn of events. ‘Equity’ is a cursed word of the modern era that deliberately represses and discriminates on account of historical revenge. It does not lead to an equal society, but a society built on aggressive political narratives tailored to fit the personal ideology of those at the top of the bureaucracy.

Sadly, this topic may be largely academic. Education statistics in the West – particularly for Australia – demonstrate that the only ‘inclusive’ item is the collective deterioration in children’s reading skills. Since so many of the great Western classics were ditched in favour of ‘culturally appropriate’ works written in the last 20-odd years, education has fallen off a cliff. It’s almost as if old books were better at expanding the minds of our children than the vast majority of what most of us call ‘useless Woke crap’ which has become the staple of our education system.

A good book can change a child’s life and set them on a path of learning – but give them a library full of tedious, political drivel written by Chat GPT and you’ll end up with a generation that places zero value in its history.

Or perhaps that’s the point?

Flat White is written and edited by Alexandra Marshall.