This is absolutely ridiculous.

Absolutely freaking ridiculous.

More ridiculous than when the teachers at my old private Islamic school went around collecting copies of Their Eyes Were Watching God from 8th grade English classes because of the sexual content in the beginning.

(Of course, after our books were taken, most of us went to the public library, checked out a copy of the book, and read the whole thing out of spite and/or curiosity. What else did the administration expect?)

Anyway, Amazon.com is being a major douche.

Long story short, Amazon has rankings for books that enable the books to show up via site search. Today, Amazon created the equivalent of an Adult back room, like at video stores.

Let’s look at how their definition of Adult (and thus stripped of rankings and removed from Site Search) breaks down:

Oh, yes.

LGBT romance books are effectively banned. Anything discussing gay or lesbian topics – even something about the history of gay rights or biographies of gay crusaders – is gone. Romance/Erotica novels are off the listing as well, though the works of certain romance authors remain for some reason. Books that are sexually progressive (like those meant to teach young girls about their bodies) or those with sexually suggestive titles (Sex and the Single Girl – not at all lewd or risque), and even the paperback of Brokeback Mountain (DVDs remain) are banned, too. And the staples of college queer theory, people like Foucault and the amazing Henry James (love the cult figure/personality, hate the person, like the author) are also on Amazon’s shit list.

Most surprising to me, personally, was that books by openly and well-known gay writers like the basically sublime Stephen Fry are gone, too. And Stephen Fry doesn’t even write exclusively about gay topics! I bet that next we’ll hear that Hugh Laurie’s work of fiction was yanked because he openly and willingly fraternizes and collaborates with openly gay writers like Stephen Fry.

News of #amazonfail has exploded on Twitter. Here are some telling tweets.

RT @carolyngoodell: “Heather Has Two Mommies” is evidently too risqué to be ranked on Amazon. #amazonfail

RT @smartbitches Yay, @powells planning a GLBT book sale in response to #amazonfail

RT: Sign the petition regarding Amazon’s anti-LGBT ranking policy http://tinyurl.com/d5dbo3 #AmazonFail is now top trending topic

RT @girlonetrack: If I were to casually mention that Amazon’s CTO is @werner, you’d all have nice things to say, right? #Amazonfail

RT: @CatalinaLoves: RT: @TristanTaormino: Amazon removes sales rank from sexuality, queer, feminist titles: http://bit.ly/rFPY #amazonfail

@SmartBitches Seriously? Foucault’s History of Sexuality? Wow. Now they’re trending *stupid* on top of bigoted prudes. #amazonfail

RT @Flutterkit: First 3 results if you type ‘homosexuality’ on Amazon.co.uk are all anti-gay. ‘Heal’ it, prevent it or fight it. #Amazonfail

RT @ kitfallen: A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality is now the top book for #amazonfail searches on “homosexuality”

How is “Making Gay History” an “adult” book? Fuckers. #amazonfail

#amazonfail is also deranking erotica. It’s not just LGBT, y’all. It’s Amazon telling us what we SHOULD read.

Have a Kindle, will not be buying books for it again. #amazonfail

Nicola Griffith: #amazonfail is “literally taking away my livelihood because my books have lesbian characters.” http://is.gd/s4z6 #LGBT …

#amazonfail Amazon is no longer showing sales ranks of books that address gay & lesbian topics.

#amazonfail. Hello Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens, Freaks and Other Outlaws has been de-ranked. For anyone wondering.

RT @EvilSlutClique:@jessicavalenti’s Full Frontal Feminism also censored by Amazon. Guess it’s those dirty F words. #amazonfail

Helen Gurley Brown’s Sex and the single Girl is totally harmless. I read that when i was about 12 FFS! #amazonfail

In the #amazonfail way of thinking, should Plato be deranked? The Symposium has a lot of talks about gay love, after all, abomination!

Marquis de Sade & Henry Miller both unranked. Quentin Crisp’s The Naked Civil Servant & The Golden Ass OK. #amazonfail

RT@neilhimself-Oranges are Not the Only Fruit & The Well of Loneliness lose Amazon ranking? Complete & utter #amazonfail http://bit.ly/JoVF

#amazonfail – one example of why too much power for one company is NEVER good – they’ve got the power to silence an whole group if they want

Now they’re deranking books by gay authors, like @stephenfry ?! WHAT THE FUCK AMAZON. #amazonfail

Seriously?

WHAT THE FUCKING HELL AMAZON?

Now, I’m not really an Amazon user. I try to buy my books elsewhere, but if there’s something on Amazon that I need that I can’t find anywhere else, sure, I’ll buy it. Amazon’s done a ton of stuff over the years that has really, really angered the Muslim community, so my image of the company was tarnished long ago. This is just another nail in the coffin, so to speak.

And yes, I realize that Amazon is a privately owned company that can do whatever it wants, but this isn’t right. It’s one of the biggest names as far as online book retailers. Yes, people buy their books at Barnes&Noble’s website, or Borders.com or Half.com or Ebay, but Amazon is the most popular of such sites. And for Amazon to just make such a large genre just disappear like that is terrible.

Homophobes.

Again, the CTO of Amazon is on Twitter. Drop him a 140 char line and let him know what you think. @werner.

Apparently, there’s also an online petition. I’m not a fan of online petitions; I prefer sending original emails to the people directly responsible or in charge, or mailing letters. But if you want to sign, click here.

I found this posted at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books:

Amazon Rank

amazon rank
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): amazon ranked

1. To censor and exclude on the basis of adult content in literature (except for Playboy, Penthouse, dogfighting and graphic novels depicting incest orgies).
2. To make changes based on inconsistent applications of standards, logic and common sense.

Etymology: from 12 April 2009 removal of sales rank figures from books on Amazon.com containing sexual, erotic, romantic, gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered or queer content, rendering them impossible to find through basic search functions at the top of Amazon.com’s website. Titles stripped of their sales rankings include “Bastard Out of Carolina,” “Lady Chatterly’s Lover,” prominent romance novels, GLBTQ fiction novels, YA books, and narratives about gay people.

Example of usage: “I tried to do a report on Lady Chatterly’s Lover for English Lit, but my teacher amazon ranked me and I got an F on grounds that it was obscene.”

Alternate usage: “My girlfriend wanted to preserve her virginity, and I was happy to respect that, then she amazon ranked and decided anal sex was okay.”

Boo, Amazon. DIAF.

Update: Left-leaning books are also being targeted. One of my Twitterfriends reports that her explicit work of erotica is still up, but the main characters are both Republicans. :-P

fail.