Monday, April 13, 2009

Homophobia at Amazon.com


According to internet reports over the weekend - Amazon.com has deemed most gay-themed books as "adult" - thus stripping them of the sales rank and making it difficult to search and/or purchase. Gay classics such as Giovanni's Room and Rubyfruit Jungle have now been effectively labeled as "porn". Andrew Holleran's Dancer From The Dance - a book that helped me to come out of the closet - is also on this list, as is Brokeback Mountain.

This is an outrage! Not to mention the fact that it takes money directly out of the pockets of gay authors (such as Dust Bunny Eric Arvin). Please go HERE and sign a petition to protest Amazon's new "Adult" policy. Homophobia will not be tolerated!



10 comments:

Eric Arvin said...

I wrote them, and the response I got back was that it was a "glitch"...uh-huh. A glitch. We'll see.

Btw, thanks for the shout-out :-)

Bob said...

Apparently Amazon is now saying it was a "glitch."
Uh huh. You got busted, so it was a "glitch." If no one noticed it would be called "policy."

Beth said...

Petition signed. That is completely unfair, because have you read some of the softcore porn they call "bodice rippers?"

kayce. said...

right... what eric and bob said: amazon is reporting that it was a "glitch". a very specific, well-executed glitch.

Ian said...

This made is way round the blogs fast!

What's the deal with retail book stores/markets this year? As I said over on Victor's blog, first we had the Barnes & Noble gaff, now Amazon. Who's next Borders???? Better not be, I shop there too much, dang it!

Anonymous said...

Glitch? What a cop-out. And Beth is right. Romance novels earn their nickname of housewife porn. They are completely explicit. Which is why I read them. Heh. I've never seen them deemed as "adult."

Amazon needs to be called on this. You can't engage in this sort of behavior and say, "whoops! It was a mistake."

the dogs' mother said...

One of the funnier episodes in the tribe's history was when two of the teenage boys discovered torrid romance novels. They highlighted certain passages and read them out loud to the other tribe members. They were absolutely stunned. This is porn, Mrs. FP, porn for women!'
Well, yes, honey and what have you learned from this...?

mrs.missalaineus said...

i agree totally with beth's comment, all that heaving bosom stuff is a) soft core porn and b) not very well written and formulaic (IMHO). i feel like i lose IQ points for walking by those displays in the bookstore.

xxalainaxx

Unknown said...

I signed the petition, and will try to stifle my laughter at the 'glitch' explanation, wondering why those glitches never seem to happen some other categories, like the Bestsellers or the like.

As for the discussion of romance novels, the work of Gordon Merrick helped me figure out a great deal, and lead me to the work of Holleran, Christopher Bram, Felice Picano, David B Feinberg, Joe Keenan, Edmund White and so many others.

Joy said...

That's crazy!! I'm signing it.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...