Katie Dancey-Downs
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Half assistant editor @IndexCensorship, half freelance writer on freedoms, the planet and culture
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Articles by Katie Dancey-Downs
The truth about book bans in the UK today
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The truth about book bans in the UK today
Katie Dancey-Downs In the last year alone, hundreds of books in the UK have been pulled off shelves in censorship attempts. These include Becoming by Michelle Obama, Twilight by Stephenie Meyer and Soul Music by Terry Pratchett. This week is Banned Books Week, an event that celebrates the right to read freely.
The truth about book bans in the UK today and the authors being pulled from the shelves
Becoming by Michelle Obama is one of hundreds of books that have been pulled from shelves - (AFP/Getty) In the last year alone, hundreds of books in the UK have been pulled off shelves in censorship attempts. These include Becoming by Michelle Obama, Twilight by Stephenie Meyer and Soul Music by Terry Pratchett. This week is Banned Books Week, an event that celebrates the right to read freely.
Krakov jako ráj knihomolů: Navštivte Schindlerovu továrnu a krčmu jako z Pána prstenů
Joseph Conrad, jeden z největších anglicky píšících spisovatelů minulého století, vyrůstal v ulici Poselska – v srdci krakovského středověkého Starého Města. Rád pobýval v místním Grand Hotelu, který se stal dějištěm románu Zaklení (The Enchanted Territories) z roku 1936, jehož autorem byl bývalý číšník Henryk Worcell. Nedaleko odtud, v kavárně Jama Michalika, se scházely bohémské kruhy a zrodil se tu první polský literární kabaret.
Meet the vanishing girl who defied the Taliban
Nearly five years after the Taliban took control of her country and she fled Kabul, Afghan journalist Zahra Joya is telling her story. Her book The Vanishing Girl of Kabul, written with British-American journalist Amie Ferris-Rotman, is a mirror not just for Joya’s life, but for millions of other Afghan women and girls, who she describes as currently living in “home prisons”. The book tells the story of the Taliban’s brutal silencing of women and Joya’s own life of resistance.
Love books? This Polish city should be your next break
Evaluating the Accuracy of Android Applications in Monitoring Environmental Noise Levels This study aimed to evaluate the accuracy of Android applications (apps) in measuring environmental noise levels, focusing on their potential use for …
Love books? This Polish city should be your next break Original
This article was produced by National Geographic Traveller (UK). Though he was one of the great English-language writers of the last century, Joseph Conrad grew up on Poselska, in Kraków’s medieval Old Town. He was known to stay at the city’s Grand Hotel, which became the setting of The Enchanted Territories, a 1936 novel by former waiter Henryk Worcell. Nearby at cafe Jama Michalika, bohemian circles gathered, and Poland’s first literary cabaret was born.
Meet the Anti-Fracking Nanas
Tina Rothery from the anti-fracking movement. (Kristian Buus / In Pictures via Getty Images) This story was originally published by The Conversationalist, an independent nonprofit publication fostering hope, empathy and community through global feminist journalism.
Kurt Vonnegut's daughter is following in his footsteps
Kurt Vonnegut and his daughter Nanette in 1997. Photo: Family handout This article first appeared in the Spring 2026 issue of Index on Censorship, The monster unleashed: How Hungary’s illliberal vision is seducing the Western world published on 2 April 2026. “My mother warned me early on that my father was going to get in trouble for writing dirty books.” Nanette Vonnegut, youngest daughter of the late American novelist Kurt Vonnegut, remembers these words vividly.
Orbán’s anti-culture club
A Fairytale for Everyone is a children’s book about marginalised people. Illustration: Labrisz / Lilla Bölecz This article first appeared in the Spring 2026 issue of Index on Censorship, The monster unleashed: How Hungary’s illliberal vision is seducing the Western world published on 2 April 2026. The article was published before Viktor Orbán’s defeat in the Hungarian elections on 12 April.
Greater Manchester school library censorship: who is accountable?
Becoming by Michelle Obama was among the targeted titles. Photo: Patti McConville/Alamy When a school librarian from Greater Manchester came to Index with a shocking story about nearly 200 books being hauled from her shelves and losing her career to a “safeguarding” complaint, we promised to conceal her identity. At her request, we renamed her Emily and we did not name the school.
School book banning escalates in the UK as Greater Manchester secondary school censors scores of books
Katie Dancey-Downs has travelled the world to tell stories about people and the planet. She’s passionate about human rights, the environment, and culture, and has a particular interest in refugee rights. Katie has written for a range of publications, including HuffPost, i News, New Internationalist, Resurgence Magazine, Reader’s Digest, and Big Issue, and is the former co-editor of the Lush Times magazine.
Unwritten chapters: The story of an Afghan girl
Farah, 25, based in Parwan province, supported her family as a civil servant and for UN agencies before the Taliban took over. Then, like so many other women, she lost her job. She did not take that sitting down and instead became involved in a centre to directly help women. But it was soon shut. Today she has no job and an increasingly unwell mother.
The Gen Z revolution will be polarised
Teenagers attend the French artist Thea's concert at the Rock en Seine festival in Paris. Photo: Telmo Pinto/SOPA Images/Sipa USA/Alamy Live News This article first appeared in the Winter 2025 issue of Index on Censorship, Gen Z is revolting: Why the world’s youth will not be silenced, published on 18 December 2025. Gen Z are in revolt. In Kenya, in Madagascar, in Nepal, young people are exercising their freedom of expression, taking to the streets and demanding change.
North Korea fears the Squid Game effect
This article first appeared in Volume 54, Issue 3 of our print edition of Index on Censorship, titled Truth, trust and tricksters: Free expression in the age of AI, published on 30 September 2025. Read more about the issue here. Kim Jong Un, supreme leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea – North Korea to you and me – is more afraid of Korean television drama series than he is of foreign attacks.
Scotland’s culture wars: the library curation challenge
A Banned Books Week event at the Scottish Parliament featured the SNP MSP Michelle Thomson, librarian and vice president of CILIPS Shelagh Toonen and Cleo Jones, the former CILIPS president and libraries development manager for City of Edinburgh Council. Photo: Katie Dancey-Downs Banned Books Week UK was revived and celebrated across the nation recently, and it spawned an important conversation in Scotland about the conflict between inclusivity and intellectual freedom.
Banned Books Week: The author writing to stop history repeating itself
Spencer Tracy in the 1944 movie The Seventh Cross, based on the Anna Seghers novel of the same name. Photo Everett Collection Inc/Alamy When award-winning author Rachel Seiffert met with Index on Censorship to talk about the freedom to read, she came armed with one of her favourite books, The Seventh Cross. Written by Anna Seghers, who was communist, Jewish and German, it’s what Seiffert describes as “an amazing cross-section of early Third Reich German life”.
An un-American story on book bans
A new documentary film, The Librarians, looks at the shocking rise of aggression towards librarians, for making certain books available for public reading. Photo: The Librarians This article first appeared in Volume 54, Issue 2 of our print edition of Index on Censorship, titled Land of the Free?: Trump’s war on speech at home and abroad, published on 21 July 2025. Read more about the issue here.
Tariffs and tight control
This week, the global conversation was dominated by one word: tariffs. China was no exception, but not all conversations were allowed to unfold freely. On major Chinese social media platforms, searches for “tariff” and “104” (a numeric stand-in) led to dead ends, error messages or vanishing posts. It wasn’t silence across the board, though. Some conversations weren’t just permitted, they were actively promoted.
The harassment of Chinese-Australian artist, political cartoonist and activist Badiucao must end
A short video featuring Badiucao championing the right to freedom of expression on a billboard in Mong Kok in March/April 2025. Source: https://x.com/badiucao/ The undersigned organisations condemn the harassment of artist, political cartoonist and activist Badiucao, which has taken place via email, in the media, and on social media in the last week. The harassment began as Badiucao was preparing to publish a statement criticising the human rights situation in Hong Kong.
UK court rejects Home Office bid to hear Apple encryption case in secret
The court responsible for hearing Apple’s challenge against the UK Government demanding that it breaks encryption has rejected the Home Office’s bid to have the case heard in secret. Earlier this year, the UK Government ordered Apple to grant it access to encrypted data stored by Apple users worldwide in its cloud service. The order, known as a Technical Capability Notice, was made under the Investigatory Powers Act 2016.
The week in free expression: 5–11 April 2025 - Index on Censorship
Police detain members of the Baloch Yakjehti Committee during a protest demanding the release of Baloch human rights activist Mahrang Baloch in Karachi, Pakistan, 24 March 2025. Photo by AP Photo/Fareed Khan In the age of online information, it can feel harder than ever to stay informed. As we get bombarded with news from all angles, important stories can easily pass us by.
The Roma women abused under Czechoslovakia’s haunting legacy
A Roma woman protesting at Ostrava Municipal Hospital. Her sign reads: "their body - their right". Photo by Vladimir Prycek / CTK Photo / Alamy Live News This article will appear in Volume 54, Issue 1 of our print edition of Index on Censorship, titled The forgotten patients: Lost voices in the global healthcare system, which will be published in April 2025. Jana Husárová was in labour with her second child when the doctor presented her with a document. “I didn’t want to sign it,” she said.
The week in free expression
In the age of online information, it can feel harder than ever to stay informed. As we get bombarded with news from all angles, important stories can easily pass us by. To help you cut through the noise, every Friday Index will publish a weekly news roundup of some of the key stories covering censorship and free expression from the past seven days. This week, we look at the detention of an Oscar Award-winning documentary maker and a poorly-monitored Signal group chat.
The women taking on authoritarian regimes
Belarusian political activist and president-elect Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya receives the NATO Parliamentary Assembly Women for Peace and Security Award at Bella Center in Copenhagen in 2023. Photo by ZUMA Press / Alamy Stock Photo On Sunday 30 March, I and mothers like me across the UK, will be waking up to a chorus of “Happy Mother’s Day!”, handmade cards and flowers thrust in our faces as we curse whoever made the decision to put the clocks forward on today of all days.
UN working group on arbitrary detention releases opinion concerning the treatment of Iranian rapper Toomaj Salehi
On 13 March 2025, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (“UNWGAD”) issued an opinion declaring that Iranian rapper Toomaj Salehi’s detention of more than 753 days was arbitrary and in violation of international law. A joint petition was submitted to the UNWGAD by the Human Rights Foundation, Doughty Street Chambers, and Index on Censorship in July 2024.
Rights groups call for Apple's closed appeal against the Home Office's encryption-breaching order to be opened to the public
Responding to news that Apple will be before the Investigatory Powers Tribunal on Friday, representatives from Big Brother Watch, Index on Censorship, and Open Rights Group have written to President of the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, the Rt Hon Lord Justice Singh, calling for the case to be made public. The letter states that the “case implicates the privacy rights of millions of British citizens who use Apple’s technology, as well as Apple’s international users”.
Students versus the state in Serbia
According to some analysts, the largest student-led demonstrations in Europe since 1968 are taking place today in Serbia. I almost missed that sentence in this story from the Sunday Times last weekend given all of the other news vying for my attention. I’m glad I didn’t. The article itself is well worth reading – a story that pulls in Abu Dhabi developers and Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner. Now dodgy planning regulations aren’t exactly the lane of Index.
This World Book Day, let's fight for the freedom to read
Today, my son trotted off to school in a hastily assembled knight-doctor-dragon combo, firmly taking on his role as the knight from Zog, whose name I can never get right. Sir Galahad? Sir Gallopalong? Ah yes, Sir Gadabout. This was his first World Book Day, and as a book-loving writer mum, it was quite the moment.
Could Donald Trump’s administration be a double-edged sword for free speech?
The second Donald Trump administration isn’t even a month old, and yet it seems as though the divisive president has already produced enough headlines to get us to the next election. With sweeping executive orders, massive cuts to federal departments and sights set on the contentious purchase of foreign lands, it’s hard to currently decipher the impact of his decisions and statements on the American people, and globally.
Index condemns the arrest of two Palestinian booksellers and calls for their immediate and unconditional release
Index on Censorship is alarmed by the arrest and ongoing detention of author Mahmoud Muna, owner and bookseller of Jerusalem’s Educational Bookshop. The Educational Bookshop specialises in Arabic and English language books on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the history of Jerusalem. Mahmoud and his nephew Ahmad Muna were arrested in the bookshop by undercover Israeli police on the afternoon of Sunday, 9 February 2025.
Under the Taliban, Afghanistan's musicians have fallen silent
A young man plays a handmade tanbur (a long-necked lute) in Zaranj. Photo by Megapress Images / Alamy This article first appeared in Volume 53, Issue 4 of our print edition of Index on Censorship, titled Unsung Heroes: How musicians are raising their voices against oppression. Read more about the issue here. The issue was published on 12 December 2024. When the Taliban seized power in Kabul in August 2021, they soon began searching people’s homes for items they deemed to be immoral.
"They controlled my voice, my body, my agency"
Iranian singer Golazin Ardestani wants to see the day when women can perform freely in Iran. Photo by Laetitia Dumez This article first appeared in Volume 53, Issue 4 of our print edition of Index on Censorship, titled Unsung Heroes: How musicians are raising their voices against oppression. Read more about the issue here. The issue was published on 12 December 2024. In around 2009, Golazin Ardestani was preparing to go on stage in Tehran. The venue was sold out.
The war on drill
This article first appeared in Volume 53, Issue 4 of our print edition of Index on Censorship, titled Unsung Heroes: How musicians are raising their voices against oppression. Read more about the issue here. The issue was published on 12 December 2024. In January 2019, there was a landmark case in British legal history – it was the first time someone received a prison sentence for performing a song.
Abdelaziz Baraka Sakin
Exile from Sudan has not silenced novelist ABDELAZIZ BARAKA SAKIN, whose words are now being shared in English - including this exclusive translation for Index. KATIE DANCEY-DOWNS introduces his work SUDANESE AUTHOR ABDELAZIZ Baraka Sakin knows a thing or two about book bans. While his first collection of short stories was welcomed and published by the Sudanese Ministry of Culture in 2005 under president Omar al-Bashir’s regime, later that year it was banned by that same ministry.
Book censorship is rife on Amazon.com, according to a report from The Citizen Lab
The Amazon campus in Silicon Valley, California. Photo: Michael Vi / Alamy Stock Photo What do rainbow-coloured hair extensions, Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Gay Science and Sex Addiction: A Survival Guide have in common? They have all allegedly been swept up in broad censorship measures by retail giant Amazon, according to a new report by The Citizen Lab, an interdisciplinary laboratory based at the University of Toronto.
Tainted scientists
A laboratory technician conducts tests in an animal research lab test area. Photo: Design Pics Inc /Alamy Lisa Jones-Engel never envisioned being thrown out of a conference hours before she was due to give a keynote speech. But that’s exactly what happened when she told the organisers of an event for scientists involved in animal testing about her new role with the non-profit People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta).
Scientists who object to animal testing claim they are frozen out by peers
Scientists who question the validity of animal experiments are warning that medical progress is being held back because they are being “frozen out” by their peers. A number of scientists based in the US claim they are being censored because of their scepticism, while others are said to be too afraid of the consequences to object to tests on animals. In an industry where evidence is paramount, they warn of a culture of entrenched attitudes instead of open-mindedness.
Scientists who object to animal testing claim they are frozen out by peers
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Scientists who object to animal testing claim they are frozen out by peers
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The show must go on
We knew it was coming. It was 28 November 2021, and I was meeting my friend Ravish for the first time in nearly 20 months. Because of Covid I had been working from home since March 2020; a home that was 660km away from Delhi. It was a smoggy winter, as is usually the case in Delhi, but that day was a bright sunny one. We walked along Lodhi Road, and at one point in our conversation Ravish turned to me and said with a grim smile: “Don’t worry.
Who holds the pen on scrutinising the most powerful?
The end of the daily Evening Standard is just one of the headlines this week. Photo: Democracy International, CC BY-SA 2.0 News – or more specifically the ownership of newspapers – has featured strongly in the news this week. Last Friday, The Jewish Chronicle (JC) – the world’s oldest Jewish newspaper – issued a terse statement saying it had removed articles written by freelance journalist Elon Perry from the paper’s website and ended its association with the writer.
The corporate silencing of the truth about Ukraine's "Holocaust by bullets"
It was a genuine privilege to co-host the UK premiere of the film From Babyn Yar to Freedom this week in collaboration with the theatre company Dash Arts. Made by Ukrainian director Oleg Chorny in 2017, the film tells the life story of the Soviet writer Anatoly Kuznetsov and his mission to bring the world’s attention to the full horror of the Babyn Yar massacre of September 1941.
Iranian filmmakers pull it out of the bag
In a perceptive video essay titled Irani Bag, made in 2020, Maryam Tafakory illustrates how Iranian filmmakers get around the Islamic taboo on touch. Interweaving her commentary with film clips from 1989 to 2018, she highlights how bags have long been a recurring device in Iranian films, allowing men and women to “touch” on screen. In one clip, a man and a woman riding on a motorbike are separated – or connected – by a bag lying between them.
Two plus two equals five in US presidential debate
Who could have predicted that Donald Trump would unite George Orwell and Taylor Swift in the form of an Index newsletter? But that’s the strange world in which we’re living. This week I’ve been obsessively telling my Index colleagues about Laura Beers’ excellent book Orwell’s Ghosts, which is full of insights about today’s political climate through the lens of the Animal Farm author’s wisdom.
Arrest of Telegram's Pavel Durov: more questions than answers
Many things can be true at the same time. Telegram is used by dissidents, including those in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, to get information out of severely restrained information environments. It is used to share child sexual abuse materials (CSAM), trade in drugs, weapons and other illicit materials, and coordinate riots and the transmission of weaponised disinformation.
Modi’s plans to muzzle India’s internet
YouTuber Dhruv Rathee is the person Indians increasingly turn to when they want news On 1 April, less than a month before India went to the polls, a young YouTuber named Dhruv Rathee released a video calling India’s Hindu nationalist prime minister a dictator. Speaking in a loud, declamatory style, Rathee delivered fact after fact, laying out how Narendra Modi had tried to throttle Indian democracy. The video ended with an appeal to vote against the Prime Minister.
The great X-odus
Why do we tolerate X? Elon Musk’s poisoned well is fast filling up with far-right propaganda, disinformation, hate speech and now, it would seem, adverts for machine guns and grenade launchers from Iran-backed terrorists in Yemen. This is the reality of the free speech utopia the world’s richest man promised us when he took over Twitter. And yet we continue to populate it with content. I do, Index does and many of you reading this will continue to do so.
The painful death of Syria’s independent media
Media freedom has been slowly dying in Syria since the Arab Spring, suffocated by a lack of regular funding and poor governance. The rise of the Arab Socialist Ba’ath Party and Hafez al-Assad’s coup in 1970 led to state dominance over all its institutions, resulting in a media monopoly that supports the regime. State television and several official daily newspapers have controlled the media landscape for over 41 years.
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