Posted on 08/03/2018 9:21:56 AM PDT by Simon Green
Amazon's policy prohibits the sale of racist and 'hatred-glorifying' goods, but a couple of watchdog groups recently found Nazi and white supremacist products sold on the platform. Those products include jewelry adorned with Nazi swastikas and even a children's book normalizing racist beliefs written by George Lincoln Rockwell, founder of the American Nazi Party. Now the company has told Minnesota Representative Keith Ellison in a letter that it has already reviewed and removed those listings. Amazon said that it has also permanently blocked the sellers who violated its policies and has put a restriction on the goods the watchdogs found to prevent them from being sold again.
One of the points the Action Center on Race & the Economy and the Partnership for Working Families raised when they called attention to the racist goods is that Amazon was profiting from "products that promote or glorify hatred, violence, racial, sexual or religious intolerance." Unfortunately, the e-commerce giant refused to disclose financial information related to the sales of those items, so we don't know how much it earned from them.
Amazon explained how it scans the products sold on its website, though, telling Rep. Ellison that it uses machine learning to automatically look at and remove listings that violate its policies:
"Amazon makes a significant investment in, and strictly enforces, our seller policies. We have developed sophisticated, automated tools that use machine learning to scan listings on Amazon, automatically removing listings found to be in violation of our policies, before we are ever notified by an external party. These automated tools are supplemented by teams of investigators that conduct manual, human review of our listings on a regular basis."
Upon checking, George Lincoln Rockwell's books are still available on the website, including one entitled White Power. It's not entirely clear if those books are still up for purchase because the website's tools weren't able to spot them or whether Amazon is still in the midst of removing the offending listings. The company did admit, however, that it's still not done pulling Nazi/white supremacists goods from its distribution centers.
Like US flags?
Well, at least they’re treating the far-Right (”white supremacists”) equally with the far-Left (”nazis”).
Will the Koran be pulled as well?
Looks like you can buy Soviet hammer and sickle stuff still. Wonder when they’re going to remove that?! /s
What about Antifa, BLS, and ISIS?
They won’t ban far left.
Yeah, I MEANT the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Lol
BLM
Well that should remove about 90% of modern black written books (cue the sound of crickets.....)
Are they going to ban Marxism and the National Question, by Josef Stalin?
Or Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-Tung?
Why not?
OH no, does that mean no more COD Games???? LOL, I bought some WW II toy soldiers in Germany, and the flea markets still had lots of WW II memorabilia. The trick was to sell them with the symbols covered by tape. So Amazon prohibits it, which means some one else will eventually fill in the gap, that’s if that freedom is no longer allowed. I remember when one could go to Walmart and buy the most realistic toy soldier stuff, and some one complained, and now they are no where to be seen. Which means, toy collectors should stick to Pokie Mon and Barbies. Thank you God for the privilege of growing up in the 50’s, when men were men and women were women and there were toys for boys and toys for girls. They were last of the tough skinned Americans.
Bet they still sell communists flags and the manifesto
From what my postal meter stamp collecting liberal ex-husband used to say decades ago.. NAZI memorabilia and ephemera are in-demand.. strictly for their historic value.
Why not, indeed?
I used to think it was just because "fascist" or "Nazi" were such strong words, they could serve to insult anyone an accuser was cross with.
My thinking has evolved.
I think the Left is deeply, congenitally afraid of the strains of European thought that brought fascism to power, and I also think they are right to be afraid.
Bureau of Land Management ?
How do “white supremacists” even get on to the left-right scale?
Hey, back in the 80’s, my childhood friend and I had the little green soldiers with tanks and trucks and all the good stuff. And we would set up our armies grab our rubber dart guns and have a war, and whoever had the last soldier/vehicle standing would win.
Good times.
Then I had to go and talk my parents into getting me an R/C tank - even better times! :)
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