Hi Joe. I appreciate where you're coming from. But lots of things should be suppressed: racism, fascism, paedophilia. I don't think anyone should be promoting racist art.

There is a stronger case, I believe, for maintaining racist art in some kind of archive. Nobody's suggesting that we should melt down or destroy copies of all racist art. But the Harry Smith Anthology was and is supposed to be a work of entertainment; it is NOT a work of museum-style historical documentation.

Perhaps it is important to keep examples of racist entertainment stored and accessible in archives such as the British Library audio servies, or their Smithsonian equivalent - for historical reference or research purposes.

But choosing not to include such songs in an album of music for people's listening pleasure is not even 'suppression', it's simply choosing not to condone racism. We shouldn't confuse entertainment with a history lesson. Would you allow a racist song onto a new compilation of mudcat contributors? No you wouldn't. Would that be 'suppression'?