Gillian Philip

Gillian is a former children's author

How ideology hollowed out children’s literature

From our UK edition

Self-immolation is a horrible way to go, but no one seems to have told that to the children’s publishing industry. Driven by religious and ideological fervour, children’s literature has rushed to adopt ‘inclusivity’ and progressivism at the cost of diversity of thought. The result is a stream of turgid books obsessed with ‘trans’. On 17 June the group SEEN in Publishing (SiP) launched its latest report in the House of Lords, hosted by Baroness Jenkin of Kennington. It’s a document that publishers should heed, though they have a history of sticking their fingers in their ears. That obtuseness is all part of their desperation to burnish their devotion to ‘progressiveness’ at all costs – even, in the case of transgenderism, at the cost of children’s wellbeing.