Amazon censors erotica and GLBT books

Over the Easter weekend, Amazon decided to derank GLBT adult and erotic fiction as well as straight erotica in addition to removing them from some searches. But get this: not all straight adult fiction with explicit sex scenes or suggestions of heterosexual relationships are included, while all but some YA (primarily lesbian) GLBT fiction without sex scenes at all were included in this deranking.

Why is this such a big deal? Aside from the policing, moralizing, narrow-mindedness of it (all queer fiction is bad, all erotica is bad), it is terrible for these companies and the writers from a business point of view. Rankings lists help give books exposure in searches and best seller lists. And we all need search engines to help get our book out there – in an incredibly large market, niche writers need all the help we can get! And I’m a part of this niche, not just in the writing side but in the purchasing side. This directly affects me.

And now Amazon has decided that adult content – or rather, what they decide is adult content – is not for virgin eyes. Who are they protecting? Children under thirteen wouldn’t be shopping on Amazon anyway, and any child using their parents’ credit card knows what adult fiction is.

In consideration of their customer base, they’re excluding adult material from rankings and some searches? These books wouldn’t be ranked so well and on best seller lists if they weren’t being gobbled up by your customer base! And what kind of books have been pulled? In addition to Erastes’s gay historical romance fiction, they pulled Brokeback Mountain, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Giovanni’s Room, The Well of Loneliness … classics! Some of which only have the suggestion of sex. But it’s GAY SEX so it’s obviously something we should hide away in the proverbial back room of Amazon.com. Autobiographies and biographies about being GLBT individuals, self-help books for GLBT individuals on coming out and parenting (including lesbian pregnancy guides and suicide prevention books for queer teens), nonfiction looks at polyamory and BDSM, criticism of religion on the basis of sexuality… these have been stripped of their rankings while intensely sexual self-help books for heterosexual couples are still ranked. They even stripped the ranking from a book on sex for people with disabilities! And what’s really frustrating is that the Kindle version of some editions are still available – Amazon doesn’t want to cut into its Kindle bottom line, but everyone else’s livelihoods can go screw themselves.

Amazon is a business of helping other businesses by providing a forum for many different kinds of sales. But Amazon has decided to cut off the queer and erotica customer base entirely and make it harder for them to function as businesses themselves. They have decided to ignore the customer base that makes some books reach best seller status. They have decided to tell their customer base what is acceptable for them to be searching for by crippling erotica and GLBT fiction/nonfiction presses and writers. Het sex manuals, explicit adult fiction that isn’t marketed as erotic, incredibly violent books … that’s fine. Gay romance, that’s obviously evil.

As important as Amazon has been to my purchases of books, movies, and DVD sets, I will not purchase from this site (they get commissions) until this new policy has reverted to its inclusive rankings and lists. It is not up to Amazon to decide what is appropriate for us to read. It is not up to Amazon to decide what is appropriate. It is not up to Amazon to alienate an ever-growing niche market and basically discriminate.

If you would like to complain to Amazon, you can send a complaint here and sign this petition . Also, let everyone else know the censorship that is going on in such a big company.

CEO mail address:
Jeffrey Bezos
1200 12th Avenue South,
Seattle, Washington 98144-2734,
United States
Phone: 206-266-1000
Fax: 206-622-2405

Growing list of affected books

Google Bomb them with Amazon Rank . Hit them where it hurts – PR.