‘Out of touch’: children’s authors describe increasing censorship of books on diversity

Authors and performers say censorship ‘a consequence of the more polarised world we are living in’. Photograph: Marc Hill/Alamy

Children’s authors and performers say growing censorship, institutional timidity and online backlash are resulting in stories about diversity, sexuality and even contemporary world events being deemed inappropriate for younger readers.

“It feels like we’re living through a second section 28, but one that the UK government has outsourced to an anonymous Twitter lobby,” one performer says.