Amazon has made a decision to strip the sales rank of LGBT books, so that they won’t appear on best seller lists. Vixialicious on Livejournal’s post on the subject is much better than anything I could’ve said.
It’s not pornography, it’s not erotica they’re going after. It’s all LGBT literature. Looking for a list of the best college guides out there? Well, the one put out by the Advocate won’t be on there. How about a list of the best Young Adult series? Well, you aren’t going to find Rainbow Road, no matter how many copies have been sold.
If they are looking to truly remove ‘adult materials’ from their search lists, why are the novels depicting graphic heterosexual sex still there? What criteria have they applied to determine what should be labeled ‘adult?’
And most importantly, WHO ELECTED AMAZON TO BE THE MORALITY POLICE?
Epic Fail, Amazon. I’m a very regular customer, but you’re on notice and am not getting any more of my money. And to do my part in the Google bombing, here’s a link to the Smart Bitches Trashy Books page for Amazon Rank.
Here’s the top hits on ‘homosexuality’ in amazon.com right now:
- A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality
- Jesus, the Bible, and Homosexuality, Revised and Expanded Edition.
- For the Bible Tells me So
- Can Homosexuality be healed?
And the same search on amazon.co.uk:
- Can Homosexuality be healed?
- A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality
- Stories from the War on Homosexuality [DVD]
- homosexuality is fun Decorated Mouse Pad
- Immorality in the Church: Homosexuality [CASSETTE]
And so on and so forth. Are you KIDDING ME? I have no words angry enough for this.
How many of these moronic queer lesbian feminist propaganda books would ever make it to the best sellers list anyway? (for normal people that is.) These books should never even be published to begin with.
I think we already have enough problems with queer lesbians like Bahai Faith lesbian feminists sneaking in laws like IMBRA which tries to ban heterosexual communication and marriage between American men and normal foreign women. Who elected Bahai Faith feminists to be the morality police?
Good for you Amazon. I guarantee you that there are far more normal customers of yours who don’t want to see this feminist crap than there are queer lesbian feminists who have nothing better to do than to write this lesbian feminist propaganda junk.
Funny how”angry” she (80 % of gay people are lesbian women) screams that normal heterosexual sex novels should be removed. “Angry” She would like that replaced with graphic queer lesbian feminist graphic sex novels instead.
These queer lesbian feminists are always “angry” at something or another.
Er, Frank? Could you maybe run that one by me again? I’m sorry, I don’t speak Troll.
Vixalicious is a Straight American. You don’t have to identify as gay to be outraged by this censorship. She is also not asking for heterosexual adult novels to be removed – but if the argument is that adult novels are to be removed from search, shouldn’t they all be, not just the gay ones? She’s asking for consistency, and I agree with her.
The good thing about Amazon has always been that they cater equally to everyone, that they weren’t pushing a specific agenda. For those of us who like to read about gender identity, queerness etc (I read a lot of this when researching my thesis on the very masculine part of rock culture that manifests in mosh pits), to have negative works getting preference over positive works in searches for political reasons is quite shocking.
As for your opinion that these books should never have been published to begin with – that’s an opinion we will never be able to agree on.
You’re going to have to argue the IMBRA stuff with someone else – I’m European (and an immigrant in the country where I live) so I have no expertise on the details of your American politics. But the issue of Amazon affects consumers all over the world, not just over there. As someone who has been a customer of amazon.com since the late 90′s, I think I’m allowed to have an opinion as a consumer.
Could you please back up your claim that 80% of gay people are lesbian with a source? I don’t accept arguments like that as facts unless you can show a reputable source.
Last commenter, your comment is irrelevant to the subject matter at hand and has been removed. I am marking you as spam if you comment in a similar way again.
Frank Johnson’s point is that feminists always cry “foul” when censorship or “moral policing” is directed against them, but they seem to have no problem dishing it to men.
When laws like IMBRA, which effectively censors the way men can use international personals ad columns to meet women, are passed, where is the “we don’t want government to be the moral police” cry? Where is the “we don’t want censorship” cry?
Why doesn’t “morality” go both ways?
What’s worse, feminists can get away with using slanderous terms like “mail order bride” and “marriage broker” to depict American men who meet foreign women the same way that any two people meet on Match.com or eHarmony.com. And yet they have a hissyfit when Amazon stops carrying a few books. What an outrage!
DelphiPro, I clearly see this is important to you, but it doesn’t belong in a discussion of the Amazon issue.
If you want to talk about IMBRA and your issue with feminists, please feel free to do so in your own blog. Make a website, show your outrage on twitter, basically do what we’ve been doing all weekend. Raise the issue with the media and try to create discussion. Don’t hijack a post of a completely different topic and try to steer towards what you want to talk about. Trying to raise visibility for your cause is admirable, but is better raised in posts that are more directly relevant to the post you’re commenting at.
I’m sorry, but I’m not going to allow further comments about IMBRA etc on this post. This post is about censorship of products in the world’s largest outlet for books. It’s a very important issue for a lot of writers and bloggers, so unless you can keep to the subject matter (and refrain from using words like ‘hissyfit’ when talking about women who are displeased with something), I would ask you to please refrain from commenting on my blog.