It should revolt the entire nation that a Scottish academic is scared to speak about her work because of the colour of her skin.

I met with Melanie Ramdarshan Bold last week, expecting a fairly bright and breezy conversation. She’s professor of children’s literature at Glasgow University and has just written a new book – the first to document the cultural significance of Paddington Bear. My reasons for setting up the interview were rather selfish. I’ve loved Paddington Bear since childhood and thought I’d turn the conversation into a light-hearted cultural column about a much-loved character from children’s literature.

I was wrong. Part of Ramdarshan Bold’s work touches on the fact that Paddington is a migrant, from Peru. She explores what the books say about Britishness, migration and race in the UK.

But she was genuinely frightened to speak about these issues. “I’m scared of talking about this,” she told me. “I don’t want to get into trouble. I’m really nervous and worried about speaking about politics and immigration.” That’s cancel culture. That’s living in a hostile environment. Ramdarshan Bold, it should be noted, is more Scottish than me. I’m from Ireland. Ramdarshan Bold is Scottish through and through. Born in Glasgow, her parents came from Mauritius decades ago to work in Scotland’s NHS.

She said it was a “scary time to be an academic and a woman of colour”. She spoke of how far-right violence and neo-Nazi displays on the streets of Glasgow had changed her perception of her home city. She now feels frightened going out.

So the Arday furore was founded on racism, was it? No, that is hypocritical nonsense

Race hate........

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