KEY TAKEAWAYS
- US government executive orders targeting EDI programmes are prompting federally funded journals to censor demographic data and equity-focused language.
- Authors and editors are pushing back to ensure data are made available and to maintain the integrity of the scientific record.
Following US government executive orders to end federal equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) programmes and to only recognise two sexes, The BMJ has emphasised the importance of retaining sex and gender data in published research. In an article in Undark, Peter Andrey Smith highlights another example of the scientific community pushing back against federal pressure to remove EDI-related data.
Authors make a stand
Smith describes the case of anthropologist Tamar Antin and co-authors, who faced an unusual request from the federally funded journal Public Health Reports following acceptance of their paper on tobacco use. The editors requested removal of the word “equitably” and demographic data, citing compliance with executive orders. Rather than grant the request, Antin and co-authors withdrew their paper entirely and went public. This “act of defiance” was met with widespread support from the scientific community, who argued that removing demographic data doesn’t just affect one paper’s conclusions – it hampers future studies by denying other scientists the opportunity to reanalyse findings or build on existing research.
“Removing demographic data doesn’t just affect one paper’s conclusions – it hampers future studies by denying other scientists the opportunity to reanalyse findings or build on existing research.”
The bigger picture
Smith also shares examples of federally funded researchers requesting:
- withdrawal
- removal of authors from bylines
- specific wording changes
to accepted papers, citing the political landscape. While this affects a minority of submissions directly, maintaining the integrity of the scientific record is paramount.
Looking ahead, the Committee on Publication Ethics’ position statement emphasises that publishing decisions and language choices should not be influenced by politics or government policies, and there is no place for retractions to censor the scientific record.
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