The editorial of last Saturday’s (January 25) The Times of Malta makes for some worrying reading.

The editorial titled “The dumbing  down of our culture” criticises several decisions taken by the present government in the cultural sector. It says, for example, that

•  Culture is clearly an inconvenient footnote for this government.
• It seems to be a recruitment agency for those who could not be given a job anywhere else.
• Since last March, we have witnessed a culling exercise of some of the best artistic brains in the island.
• Parliamentary Secretary José Herrera gave indications he was unsuitable for the job when he mulled the idea of having three carnivals a year.
• It asks why we are still without an artistic director for the Valletta 2018 celebrations.
• It criticises the decision to organise, as part of the ‘initiatives’ for V-18, a revamped Malta Fashion Week, a Valletta Green Consciousness Festival and, wait for it, an Under-17 Football Tournament!

This is not what I find most worrying.

One can argue for and against high and low culture to one’s heart’s content. One side will call the other side elitist; while the other one will dub the others as populist. This is not the argument I want to get entangled with … … for now.

What really worried me is another section of the editorial; a subject about which the Editor himself is worried. I will produce it verbatim:

“What is equally worrying is the artistic community, as Mr Gatt [the outgoing general manager of St James Cavalier] rightly pointed out. While in private, the majority are lamenting the sorry state of our culture, in public they are afraid to speak because, they claim, Malta is too small.”

People in the cultural and artistic sectors are renowned for being free spirits not for being cowards. If what the Editor is writing is correct it is very sad to point out that our artistic community is made of cowards and not of free spirits.

 I hope that people from the artistic community will speak out about this subject to show whether the Editor’s damning assertion is correct or not. If they keep mum they act more in the fashion of kittens than tigers.

I will not be surprised is silence will be the option taken by many. One does not expect mettle or depth from the likes of those who compared Piano’s masterpiece at Valletta’s entrance to a cheese grater.