A 'side benefit' to the sensitivity changes to the work of Ian Fleming and Agatha Christie is it allows their Estates and their publishers to re-assert copyright; this keeps the books out of the public domain, the prices high, and unable to be 'remixed'.
Fleming died in 1964, so his work is already free in the UK and Canada. (Not for long).
Christie died in 1976, but some of her work -- published prior to 1928 -- is in the public domain in the USA. (Again not for long.)
Roald Dahl and Dr. Seuss both died in the 90s so their estates are able to cash out until at least 2065. (And now much longer presuming their texts are altered in 2023.)
The incentives are all wrong here. It is in the publisher's interest to make changes. (Watch for Sherlock Holmes to stop smoking and doing cocaine in the next cynical attempt to claw back licensing fees!)
The argument for sensitivity changes is market-driven to begin with so finger waving at the Estates for this only gets one so far -- and there are other considerations* -- but this is literally stealing from the public good.
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*(As others have pointed out, Christie specifically manipulated her reader's expectations using stereotypes, so omitting and altering her words is beyond cosmetic. Not to mention the integrity, speech, and archivist causes.)
Salt-Alarm-9103 t1_jdvvo2e wrote
I think the Suess estate was acting in good faith when they pulled a tiny percentage of titles they never intended to edit the books. The unintended effect was disinformation that created a massive uproar along the lines of “Dr. Suess Canceled!” (Thanks Fox News) Which in turn spurred on a huge sales boom for all Suess books. I think others are trying to copy that success.