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Edinburgh Reporter

Women discussing books at the Book Festival

A small group of women gathered in the cafe at Edinburgh Futures Institute with a suitcase of books which they set out to read and discuss. They represented a range of groups which anyone following Scottish public debate is familiar with. They are names known quite well in the area of discussion of gender related matters and included representatives from Women4Scotland and their supporters including Joanna Cherry, KC. Women4Scotland is a campaign group which took The Scottish Government to court over the definition of sex – and celebrated the decision handed down by the Supreme Court that sex is defined by biology. They seek to protect nd strengthen women's rights aiming to promote evidence based discussion so their presence today was not surprising According to Lucy Hunter Blackburn, co author of the best selling book, The Women Who Wouldn't Wheesht, she had come to meet up with friends. She explained that the Book Festival did not invite any of them to take part in the official festival platform so they had brought their own favourite books to talk about them and swap them. Ms Hunter Blackburn said: 'We decided that if the book festival wasn't going to have our voices on its official platforms, we could meet up and bring our favourite books and talk about them and swap them and just be here with the books that matter, because it's a book festival. 'What we'd really like people to do is read these books. I would especially like them to read Jenny Lindsay's Hounded. We will be putting pictures up on social media of this kind of library for people interested in books on this issue.' When asked what this 'issue' means Lucy explained: 'I mean the lives of women as a group of people defined by our sex. We have books here about recent political debates around gender identity and sex. We also have important books about maternity, the ways that sex affects women's daily lives. There are so many books which have been written and it is a shame the festival seems to have gone off this as a topic. We hope they will come back to it.' Earlier this week it became known that the National Library of Scotland have removed the book The Women Who Wouldn't Wheesht from an exhibition – said to be as a result of pressure from staff. Dr Pam Gosal, MBE, MSP said she has written to the Culture Secretary Angus Robertson to express her disappointment. She said: 'Excluding a book which reflects the sentiments of a significant portion of the Scottish population constitutes discrimination. Lucy said: 'I think we've seen from the Freedom of Information released from the National Library that there is a real problem in cultural institutions that a minority of staff are determined that voices like ours certainly what shouldn't get platformed and shouldn't be heard, and managements need to get braver and need to stand up to that.' Elaine Miller who lives in Edinburgh and has spoken about women's issues on many occasions – including when she stood as a candidate in the Corstorphine/Murrayfield by-election – was part of the small group. She said: 'We have gathered to look at books that we have and discuss books that we don't think that the Edinburgh book festival would be interested in platforming, because they're by women talking about women's issues. It seems that this international festival which is funded on public money, isn't interested in our voices, and that's why they're not supporting a best selling book, which I am part of.' Ms Miller denied that any of the books are controversial. She said: 'I think that women talking about issues that pertain to themselves is just routine and normal. We have representatives from all sorts of people. I think other people have described me as gender critical. I don't personally think I criticise gender. I don't care if someone has a gender expression. I am sex factual – sex is real and matters. I know that because I am female and it impacts on my life. So I wouldn't describe myself as gender critical but apparently I am.' The Book Festival has been approached for comment. Joanna Cherry KC and Susan Dalgety Like this: Like Related