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NEWS: Amazon Pulls Some Yaoi/BL Manga from U.S. Kindle Store


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_V_



Joined: 13 Apr 2009
Posts: 619
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 11:31 am Reply with quote
Hey you can't just *decide* that its inappropriate!

http://video.adultswim.com/aqua-teen-hunger-force/drunk-snake.html
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neocloud9



Joined: 06 Oct 2008
Posts: 1178
Location: Atlanta, GA
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 11:50 am Reply with quote
Quote:
The Comic Book Resources website's Robot 6 blog further notes that other explicit comics featuring heterosexual encounters remain on the site, along with a wide variety of erotic prose.


Hellooo, double-standard! Confused
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dewlwieldthedarpachief



Joined: 04 Jan 2007
Posts: 751
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 11:56 am Reply with quote
There are enough reasons to stick with print without amazon inventing new ones.
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SnaphappyFMA



Joined: 14 Jan 2009
Posts: 216
Location: California
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 11:59 am Reply with quote
Okay, not happy about this. Mad

There's all kinds of adult content (heterosexual adult content) in other books you can get on the Kindle, but when it's m/m, I guess it triggers increased scrutiny (unfairly). Plus, Selfish Demon King is a yaoi prose novel - not a manga. I thought they were going after explicit illustrated works rather than just prose/text works. The cover illustration for Selfish Demon King shows an adult male with a rather young-looking uke male sitting on his lap, but by young, I mean teenage-looking, not like a child. Could that be it? Are they judging and ruling out just on the look of the covers now?

Welcome to censorship in America. Evil or Very Mad
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Echo_City



Joined: 03 Apr 2011
Posts: 1236
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 12:30 pm Reply with quote
Multiple people have mentioned that there exists "heterosexual adult content" on Kindle which can be procured, yet no one has confirmed that said heterosexual adult content is comparable to the homosexual content that has been removed. Do these heterosexual adult works also contain underage relationships? This trait seems to be a common denominator between all the removed works. Before the "double standard" flag is thrown down, it should be corroborated. It's not as though all homosexual works have been proscribed while all heterosexual work remains.
Quote:
Are they judging and ruling out just on the look of the covers now?

While I find it likely that the cover for SDK, where a depicted person does not appear 18+, was used to condemn the work, with our ridiculous laws content providers have much incentive to drop the hammer on work for such petty reasons. This being the internet & ANN, I'm sure we're all well versed in such ludicrous laws as the Protect Act & its ilk. That cover alone would cause the work to fail the Miller Test (especially if the nature of the work were known to all involved in assigning the ranking.)

Short answer to your question: Yes, because they have to.

Infamously several heterosexual works involving or pertaining to underage relationships were pulled by Amazon. That gives credence to Amazon in that at least they seem to maintain a relatively equal amount of heavy-handed censorship between the 2 "types" of works.


Last edited by Echo_City on Wed May 04, 2011 12:31 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Nemo_N



Joined: 12 Dec 2006
Posts: 272
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 12:31 pm Reply with quote
Once again, teh gay treated as an insidious force that should be repressed.

I will never understand people who seem to think that human sexual behaviour stems from the outside, like from works of fiction. As if sexual desires were something you catch, like a virus.

But while such idea persists, this kind of events will keep happening.
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The Yaoi Review



Joined: 12 Dec 2008
Posts: 13
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 12:33 pm Reply with quote
We're trying to confirm if this is an age thing as DMP's stories had at least one high school type story in them or character that appeared to not be 18. It wasn't my understanding that the Yaoi Press titles were all underage characters though but I'm double-checking on that. From what I've heard Amazon say, it was due to explicit images. I guess we'll find out. If it is a high school story thing, we need to prepare for many more titles getting banned. It only takes one story in a yaoi anthology to ban the entire book. Many yaoi titles have one-shots in them as well.
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Echo_City



Joined: 03 Apr 2011
Posts: 1236
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 12:35 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Once again, teh gay treated as an insidious force that should be repressed.

I will never understand people who seem to think that human sexual behaviour stems from the outside, like from works of fiction. As if sexual desires were something you catch, like a virus.

We haven't established if the works were blocked JUST because they're gay, or if it is because of the nature of the homosexual relationships contained therein.

If it were ALL gay works Amazon were banning, your statement could be made with assured veracity. There are still gay works on Amazon, so further corroboration will be needed before a sweeping statement such as that can be made in earnest.

Again, it's not as though Amazon hasn't banned homosexual works as well.

EDIT: I didn't see the above post before posting this. Awaiting that intel if underage characters were the reason for the ban.
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decepticons2



Joined: 22 Oct 2008
Posts: 56
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 1:00 pm Reply with quote
I don't understand people. Digital content should be the most free content in the world. The only people to blame for seeing said content is the people looking at it.

There are no special rooms needed or chance of it being put next to Pokemon. While I have zero interest in this content if it is legal content for where amazon distributes then put it up.

Two damn things the rest of the world needs to realize.

1) It ain't 1990 the genie is out of the bottle.

2) Its the damn internet.

Those of us that are older probably remember when the lady with the snakes was shocking. Now she seems pretty damn tame. Sell it, tax it, and make money. Last time I checked US sells tobacco and alcohol.
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Echo_City



Joined: 03 Apr 2011
Posts: 1236
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 1:20 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Last time I checked US sells tobacco and alcohol.
The US governments also spend money to encourage (propaganda) to dissuade their residents from consuming tobacco & alcohol. The governments also relies heavily on the "sin tax" that they've levied on these goods.

In irony, they experience budget shortfalls when their costly propaganda (among other things) has lead to a reduction in "sin tax" income on the products their propaganda rails against.

Point being that the US Goverment(s) don't know what they want, and their actions are rarely dictated by logic. They want to make money off of "disreputable" items, but they also don't want "disreputable" items to be sold Sad Sad

Quote:
if it is legal content for where amazon distributes then put it up.
Part of the problem is that the content in question may very well be illegal. If it isn't now, if the issue were pushed it could easily be deemed to be. As EuroTrip stated, America is a country founded (and comprised of) [prejudicial generalizations are not tolerated].
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Tascar



Joined: 14 Nov 2005
Posts: 18
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 1:24 pm Reply with quote
In response to Echo_City and The Yaoi Review's musing on whether or not there is similar content on the Kindle Store that contains underage sex, there is that one section of "The Vagina Monologues," which is on the Kindle Store called "The Little Coochie Snorcher That Could" about the 24-year-old woman who seduces and has sex with a 16-year-old girl (much younger in the original version of the story). So I am not sure why the yaoi prose novel was removed when "The Vagina Monologues" remains.
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Eri94



Joined: 14 Feb 2011
Posts: 220
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 1:26 pm Reply with quote
Well it looks like this situation is...

*puts on sunglasses*

Pretty gay.

YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH
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PetrifiedJello



Joined: 11 Mar 2009
Posts: 3782
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 1:29 pm Reply with quote
SnaphappyFMA wrote:
Welcome to censorship in America. Evil or Very Mad

I pledge allegiance, to the receipt, of the United States of Amazon, and to its market place for which it sells, one nation under Visa, indivisible (by zero), with carts and free shipping for all.

Personally, I've no clue why Bezos would allow such a thing, but this is only based on the premise he actually runs the company.
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Megiddo



Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Posts: 8360
Location: IL
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 1:36 pm Reply with quote
Tascar wrote:
So I am not sure why the yaoi prose novel was removed when "The Vagina Monologues" remains.

Does "The Vagina Monologues" have an illustration showing that couple?
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configspace



Joined: 16 Aug 2008
Posts: 3717
PostPosted: Wed May 04, 2011 1:44 pm Reply with quote
Echo_City wrote:
As EuroTrip stated, America is a country founded (and comprised of) prudes.

Not entirely accurate. America was settled by prudes, and is comprised of many prudes, but founded by very liberal in the classical sense, and actually not-so-popular men.

In any case the content is certainly legal. Amazon is very irrationally selective about what they remove.

Unbeknownst to most, this happens often to various minorities of "deviant content" authors/publishers.

For example, a prior incident, not manga and purely written literature involving incest:

http://theselfpublishingrevolution.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazon-in-book-banning-business.html

http://www.teleread.com/ebooks/amazon-removes-incest-related-erotica-titles-from-store-kindle-archive/
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