Accusations activists are HIDING Sharron Davies' book in Waterstones
EXCLUSIVE: Now Waterstones is hit by accusations trans activists are HIDING Sharron Davies’ book because it says it is unfair biological males can self-ID to compete as women in sports
- EXCLUSIVE: Customer claimed they couldn’t buy Unfair Play at Waterstones
- Waterstones said that the book was in stock in all three shops customer went to
- Sharron Davies’ book covers biological males competing as women in sports
Waterstones has been hit by accusations that trans activists are hiding Sharron Davies’ book because it says it is unfair biological males can self-ID to compete as women in sports.
The former British Olympic swimmer, who has backed World Athletics’ decision to exclude trans athletes from women’s category events, published Unfair Play with Craig Lord on June 22 this year.
But one frustrated customer has claimed that she was unable to purchase the £20 hardback (RRP) from three different Waterstones stores – despite the bookseller admitting publicly that they were definitely in stock.
Davies, who missed out on Olympic gold aged 17 as a result of blatant doping among East German athletes in the 1980s, discusses in the book how progress in women’s sport could be stalling – or even falling – as a result of long-standing sexism in sport.
The 60-year-old writes about how biological males competing directly against women under the guise of trans self-ID could destroy the integrity of female sport.
Waterstones has been hit by accusations that trans activists are hiding Sharron Davies’ book because it says it is unfair biological males can self-ID to compete as women in sports. Pictured: Former Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies
One frustrated customer has claimed that she was unable to purchase the £20 hardback from three different Waterstones stores – despite the bookseller admitting publicly that they were definitely in stock. Pictured: Unfair Play by Sharron Davies
Waterstones Help confirmed that the book is in stock at all of the shops the customer was unable to purchase it
Outside of sport, trans issues are also heavily in the limelight at the moment, especially over the introduction of controversial gender neutral toilets in public spaces and schools.
One woman, Nikki, who tried to buy the book at the York, Galleria Hatfield and Hitchin stores complained to Waterstones on Twitter when she was unable to get hold of a copy.
She posted: ‘Hey @Waterstones three out of the three of your branches I visited in the last week could not locate a copy of ‘Unfair Play’ by @sharrond62. “It’s in Sport section” I was told. It was not. Nor was it in any other section. Is there a problem with stocking the book perchance?’.
The Waterstones Help account then replied: ‘Hi Nikki, would you mind sharing which shops you visited? We have only a handful of shops waiting on stock currently and it should have been possible to find a copy in all the rest.’
After responding to tell the help page which stores she had been to, Waterstones replied to her: ‘Hi Nikki, the book is in stock in all of those so we’ll check in with the teams there to ensure they all know where the book is shelved. Thank you.’
The customer was praised by others, with one posting: ‘Good work! Only constant surveillance exposes these activists.’
Another alleged that books could be being ‘suppressed’ by activists in stores. A third said: ‘May have been turned to hide it.’
And a fourth added: ‘Probably people hiding it’.
Tennis great Martina Navratilova, who is also vocal about only allowing biological women to compete in women’s sports, simply shared the tweet with the caption: ‘Hmmm’.
A spokesman for Waterstones told MailOnline that ‘shops do not hide books from customers’.
Tennis great Martina Navratilova, who is also vocal about only allowing biological women to compete in women’s sports, simply shared the tweet with the caption: ‘Hmmm’.
Davies missed out on Olympic gold aged 17 as a result of blatant doping among East German athletes in the 1980s. Pictured: Davies celebrates silver medal with gold medal winner Petra Scheider who unwillingly doped
They added: ‘Unfair Play is stocked by the vast majority of our shops and sales suggest that the book is being found easily enough.
‘Of course, as with all books that sell, occasionally a shop will temporarily run out of copies before a new delivery arrives, but our booksellers will then be able to place an order for customers.’
Waterstones has previously been accused of trying to ‘cancel’ bestselling author Helen Joyce after she criticised trans rights activists.
After the publication of Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality in 2021, Joyce claimed some branches of Waterstones were trying to suppress her sales. They denied this.
Davies is a blisteringly forthright advocate for women in sport. She lost out on a gold medal in Moscow in 1980 after coming second behind 17-year-old East German swimmer Petra Schneider – whose victory was drug enhanced.
She calls it ‘the biggest heist in sports history, an official cheating plan that made the German Democratic Republic (GDR) the most successful medal factory in Olympic history’.
‘The crime,’ she says, ‘began with a group of men agreeing if they could make a woman more like a man, the chances of her beating other women in speed and strength sports were extremely high.’
The male hormone testosterone was administered routinely to female athletes from the GDR and they had no choice but to take it. It made them virtually invincible.
Davies (pictured) is a blisteringly forthright advocate for women in sport and her book covers the topic in detail
All that happened 40 years ago, before the fall of the Berlin Wall, but she believes a similarly gross iniquity is being played out in women’s sport today.
Davies sees echoes of the institutionalised cheating that robbed her — and many other athletes — of medals in the growing prevalence of transgender women in sports, all over the world, today.
The Olympian believes that sportswomen are being denied records, sponsorship, honours and acclaim because biological males identifying as women are taking over their sports.
In March, Davies thanked World Athletics for ‘standing up for female athletes’ after they banned trans athletes from competing in the female category at international athletics events.
It came after Lord Coe told BBC Radio 4 that there was a clear consensus ‘from the vast majority of the core stakeholders we have’, including female athletes, coaches, and member federations.
Davies said: ‘Thank you Seb Coe and World Athletics for standing up for female athletes across the world who are worthy of fair sport.’
She thanked her supporters, adding: ‘Hopefully we have our sport back. Sport is for all but only where you qualify in the fair category for your biological reality. We’ll keep fighting till all girls’ sport is protected.’
Lord Coe is one of several high-profile names to throw their weight behind the Mail on Sunday’s campaign for Davies to be handed the Olympic gold medal she had stolen from her in Moscow.
Double Olympic decathlon champion Daley Thompson, a British team-mate of Davies, Duncan Goodhew and Nicole Cooke are also calling for justice to be served.
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