Amazon dominates the market
Jeffrey Trachtenberg at the Wall Street Journal reports:
Amazon Inc. said it recently removed a three-year-old book about transgender issues from its platforms because it decided not to sell books that frame transgender and other sexual identities as mental illnesses.
The company explained its decision in a letter Thursday to Republican Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida, Mike Lee of Utah, Mike Braun of Indiana and Josh Hawley of Missouri, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. The senators had written last month to Chief Executive Jeff Bezos requesting an explanation of why “When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment” was no longer available on Amazon nor on its Kindle and Audible platforms.
How I hate to agree with Rubio and Hawley on anything.
“When Harry Became Sally,” written by the conservative scholar Ryan T. Anderson, was published in February 2018. The book focuses on a variety of issues including gender identity.
It’s not only conservatives who don’t agree that Harry can become Sally though.
“Everyone agrees that gender dysphoria is a serious condition that causes great suffering,” said Mr. Anderson and Roger Kimball, the publisher of Encounter Books, the New York-based nonprofit that published the book, in a statement Thursday in response to Amazon’s letter.
“There is a debate, however, which Amazon is seeking to shut down, about how best to treat patients who experience gender dysphoria,” they added, calling their book “an important contribution” to that conversation. “Amazon is using its massive power to distort the marketplace of ideas and is deceiving its own customers in the process,” they said.
Do we want Amazon deciding what books we can acquire? I don’t think so.
But some “sexual identities” sure look a lot like mental illness, or are at least tagging along with other psychological issues to keep them company. Stefoknee Wolscht isn’t what I’d call a poster boy for normal mental health. The Litigant Formerly Known as Yaniv is right up there, too. Without the dubious “boy brain/girl brain” thing, it seems to be just delusional kink with an unhealth dose of narc powertripping for too many of them. If there is no “male/female” brain, then believing you are the opposite sex is delusional, as much as my believing I’m not a mammal.
hmm.. yet they still sell The Bell Curve…..
I think they already do, to a point, as they do not stock every book in every format.
This is no different from the “Dr Suess Cancellation Parade” in that a private company is making a commercial decision. We cannot support Dr Suess Enterprises’ decision and then howl down Amazon, especially when Amazon is not the world’s sole bookseller.
Roj: The “only a private company” defense only goes so far. When a company’s market dominance reaches a certain point, its decisions simply are the market’s decisions. This is a large part of why we have anti-monopoly laws on the books and should enforce them. Amazon may not be the world’s sole bookseller, but its choices shape the market. When Amazon decides that it will no longer carry a certain sort of book, that affects what publishers are likely to accept, what agents are likely to push, what editors are likely to advise, and ultimately what authors are likely to write.
Yep, I understand all that, but the problem is, how or who mandates the books Amazon MUST carry? As I said, we already know they don’t stock all books, and as with the Suess fauxtroversy, books come and go out of print all the time.
If the market dictates that Amazon is “the world’s bookseller” then how do
youwe circumvent the market?…
Make no mistake, I am not defending Amazon as I actually despise what they have done to so many smaller businesses and for the total disregard for employees. It is just that this is a difficult area to navigate.
A side issue, perhaps, but I think it’s important to note that Amazon hasn’t taken an ideological position here. The decision is based on an algorithm. The mob spoke and Amazon complied. This is what we ought to be afraid of; Amazon – like every other large platform – does what the bullies tell it to, without conscience, consideration or consequence.
And a lot of people want it that way.
I’m more inclined toward Nullius’ point of view, here. Amazon has put itself in a position of market dominance and it ought to take some responsibility. An ideological position, I could accept. I have no problem with Christian or Muslim booksellers, for example, though I despise their stock. It’s up front. You know what you’re getting. What Amazon’s doing is different. It has placed itself as a universal marketplace but it’s defining that marketplace by stealth, on the basis of what’s popular. And what’s popular is defined by what ideologies are trending, not which opinions are actually most common. This means that lobby groups can effectively define the marketplace and Amazon is all too pleased to let it happen.
It’s dangerous. Cancelling things because of the views of the authors rather than their content is dangerous enough, but Amazon amplifies this tendency beyond anything we’ve seen before and it makes it easy for bullies to remove dissenting voices. We need to be careful about this.
Roj #2, I’m glad you broke the ice on some dilemmas about what to do. But to be accurate:
1) Dr. Seuss Enterprises ceased their publication of 6 books. That would be analogous to Encounter Books ceasing their publication of When Harry Became Sally — but that’s not what happened.
2) eBay banned selling the 6 Dr. Seuss books. That is analogous to Amazon delisting When Harry Became Sally.
So my point is a clarification, that Dr. Seuss Enterprises and Amazon did two different things.
IMO “The they don’t stock all books, doesn’t carry much weight.” My local book store doesn’t carry all books either, but the result of that is that I have to wait longer if I order a book they don’t have in stock. It doesn’t mean I can’t order the book with them.
Also with the evolution in the direction of “Print by demand” where some books are only printed when they are ordered the idea of needing to have a book in stock in order to be able to sell it doesn’t seem relevant anymore.
Amazon has also stopped selling ebooks and audiobooks on their imprint to libraries. So far it’s not printed books, but maybe that’s only a matter or time. The whole ebook landscape is horrible, but Amazon has made it worse. Amazon needs to be broken up. Too much power over too many sectors of the economy. And, now, too much influence over what is actually published or sold.
Re print on demand: there are also e-books. Amazon sells a lot of those, sells devices on which to read them, and maintains the library where the e-books are saved. I assume their decision means they will no longer sell the e-book version of this book. I hope it does not mean they will remove copies of the e-book from their cloud library.
I wonder if publishers ceasing publication of a print book also necessarily means that e-book versions will no longer be able to be purchased.
@Sackbut;
Amazon deleting books on my kindle which I’ve already purchased and downloaded strikes me as theft. I think that would occur to a lot of people, including, I hope, lawyers.
Amazon removing ebooks from people’s libraries is not unlikely. As far Amazon is concerned, we don’t own the books we buy from them.
Saw a quote somewhere which went “There are two kinds of people; those who cheer when big business and government start shutting down the voices they don’t like — and those who remember history.”
Re: Amazon and ebooks.
Over ten years ago now, we actually got a perfect omen of things to come. Amazon silently updated the text of a certain book that was already on users’ Kindles. As in, people had downloaded the book, started reading, and then the book changed.
Seemed fishy to me at the time.
Oh, you’re curious what book it was? I mean, it wasn’t a well known title or anything, just something by some guy named Orwell. Might have been called Nineteen Eighty-Four.
On Amazon and the market. In my town there were once two bookstores; they are both gone now. Neither of them stocked many books I would like to read, but the one that sold new books would order books for me. The public library has little that I would like to read, being geared toward a mainstream audience, but will order interlibrary loan books. It is not unusual that they are unable to find them at a library that will loan them. Ditto the college library; small, and the only books I would be interested in are ones I donated. Which I have already read.
So Amazon becomes the only choice unless one wants to drive to Lincoln. That’s what I do; Lincoln still has some great bookstores, but they are disappearing there, too, especially with the pandemic. And the pandemic means I don’t go to Lincoln anymore. Twice in the past year, when I was accustomed to getting there twice a month. I try to find a variety of sources, but Amazon sometimes is the only option. I wish it were otherwise. And I find it disgusting that they are determining that I can’t buy gender critical books, partially because they will likely change the rest of the market (like someone else mentioned). It’s like when California and Texas decide on their textbooks, it tends to control what is available for the rest of us, because the size of that market drives a lot of decisions.
I do think Amazon will find this isn’t a great decision. I think the market for gender critical books may be larger than they realize, and the push back may be stronger than they expect. In reality, the “woke” market isn’t a large one, and a lot of millennials do not buy books. I suspect there are a lot of GC feminists like me, who purchase and read large numbers of books.
When Harry Became Sally is a bestseller, Barnes and Noble will deliver it to you, and you can get a digicopy on Apple Books (my bookstore of choice these days), and there are many other outlets including the publisher themselves. I don’t think it’s a good decision on Amazon’s part, but all I can think is that there must be some naive executive (or 2 or 3) that haven’t figured out what the trans cult is about yet. The fact that both the ultra conservatives and the radical left are both wrong about the trans cult makes it a no brainer for me, I have better things to do besides either think the trans people are retards, want to squash them, or naively indulge them in their misogynist agenda. It’s unconvincing from the get go. (not to mention Anderson’s other book, still available on Amazon, which is against gay marriage) I would hope Amazon, being a huge multinational, all-things-to-all-people entity, would be more moderate and more inclusive outlet for books and largely anti-censorship, but generally, how people have caved to the trans cult’s agenda is baffling in the extreme to me anyway. Sure, we all want them to be safe and not harmed, not discriminated against, blah blah blah, but ultimately they are creating their own problems.
All the above comments simply confirm for me that I was right to stay out of the Amazon ecosystem for eBooks. The eBooks I have are not licensed, they are mine to keep and read forever, just like a printed book.
I use Calibre, a free program, to maintain my library, and Aldiko eBook Reader (free or paid versions) for my phone and tablet. Neither of those programs can make any alterations to my eBooks. Calibre also has the ability to strip DRM to ensure I do get to keep what I have paid for.
In some ways the Dr Seuss matter is more final – since I doubt anyone else has the right to publish those books (not commenting on the rightness of the decision). Theoretically, someone banned by Amazon could take their book elsewhere, although I do think the chilling effect is the biggest problem. No one will end up commissioning books Amazon won’t carry.