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One of my favorite gay authors, Rob Byrnes (The Night They Met), alerted me to the fact that over the last couple of days, e-commerce giant Amazon.com has taken the unprecedented step of listing most of the gay titles on its enormous website as containing Adult Content.
The result is that books by acclaimed authors such as Christopher Rice, Tom Spanbauer, Edmund White, Stephen McCauley, and Marc Acito are excluded from sales rankings and from some searches.
According to an Amazon Advantage service representative:
In consideration of our entire customer base, we exclude “adult” material from appearing in some searches and best seller lists. Since these lists are generated using sales ranks, adult materials must also be excluded from that feature.
Being delisted from the rankings doesn’t mean that the book giant has stopped selling the title; it just means that the title won’t show up with a public sales ranking or in the best-seller lists–often a factor in how shoppers make their purchases.
According to Byrne, at the same time, “straight-written gay-themed fiction (Michael Chabon’s The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, for one; my friend Diana Gabaldon’s Lord John series for another) retains its normal status.”
Read all about the controversy here, then sign this online petition and make your voice heard. Better yet, DO NOT BUY FROM AMAZON until this policy has been reversed.
9 responses so far ↓
1 Laura Calvo // Apr 13, 2009 at 2:26 am
It’s been reversed. According to Amazon it was just a “glitch”. A glitch that made twitter really twitter. #amazonfail was the number one trend on twitter today.
2 hector jones // Apr 13, 2009 at 3:13 am
I am so shocked bythis! What kind of censorship is this. We need ot write and call amazon and register our dismay. But here’s what some people are doing–making use of the tags!
http://lafiga.firedoglake.com/2009/04/13/cheney-and-lesbians-tag-teaming-amazon-in-response-to-sales-ranking-censorship/
3 Norm! // Apr 13, 2009 at 7:37 am
More disturbingly, Amazon.com proudly carries anti-gay titles such as “The Map: for the journey away from homosexuality”, “Loving Homosexuals as Jesus Would: A Fresh Christian Approach” and other “ex-gay” titles.
And Target.com also carries these Amazon.com products.
4 Floyd Sklaver // Apr 13, 2009 at 8:24 am
Laura, the problem has NOT been fixed yet. Yes, Amazon claims it was a glitch but they have not “straightened” it out just yet.
5 Floyd Sklaver // Apr 13, 2009 at 8:25 am
BTW, here are the numbers for some of the Amazon Board of Directors. Flood all these people with your complaints ASAP.
Thomas O. Ryder (914) 244-5782
William Gordon (650) 233-2750
Alain Monie (206) 266-1000
L. John Doerr (650) 233-2750
Tom Alberg (206) 674-3000
Patricia Stonesifer (206) 709-3140
6 Ricky // Apr 13, 2009 at 11:54 am
Wow looks like Floyd Sklaver has become our local version of Bill O’Reilly when something isn’t as they wish. Boycotts, people’s names and phone numbers. Gonna go ambush somebody next?
7 christian // Apr 13, 2009 at 2:46 pm
Thansk for the info Floyd, I emailed all my friends the inof so that they could sign the petition as well. Ricky, do you really think that Floyd is like Bill O’Reilly? Really? Should he just let it fly by and not alert people?
8 Floyd Sklaver // Apr 14, 2009 at 7:17 am
These are their office phone numbers. The fact that they are officers of Amazon and where they work is public information that’s available on Amazon’s website. So, sorry, Ricky, but giving out that information does not impede their privacy in any way that I can see.
9 Ricky // Apr 14, 2009 at 12:09 pm
No mention in my post about privacy matters. Just like Bill O’Reilly. When he puts up names, photos, does ambushes, it’s all perfectly legal and info. that is already out there … just in terrible taste and, in my opinion, of short-sighted logic. OK I’m done. I don’t know what compelled me to post in the first place. Have a good one everybody!
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