“Giovanni’s Room” by James Baldwin is now porn because Baldwin was gay and the book has gay characters? Excuse me?

This is one of those reports that is difficult to confirm. But I did check Giovanni’s Room on Amazon, and in fact, Amazon no longer shows a “sales ranking” for it, just as the reports allege. And I just found out that the LA Times appears to have confirmed it:

“American Psycho” is Bret Easton Ellis’ story of a sadistic murderer. “Unfriendly Fire” is a well-reviewed empirical analysis of military policy. But it’s “Unfriendly Fire” that does not have a sales rank — which means it would not show up in Amazon’s bestseller lists, even if it sold more copies than the Twilight series. In some cases, being de-ranked also means being removed from Amazon’s search results.

Other books virtually burned by Amazon for being gay, per the LA Times:

Our research shows that these books have lost their ranking: “Running with Scissors” by Augusten Burroughs; “Rubyfruit Jungle” by Rita Mae Brown, “Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic” by Alison Bechdel, “The History of Sexuality, Vol. 1” by Michel Foucault, “Bastard Out of Carolina” by Dorothy Allison (2005 Plume edition), “Little Birds: Erotica” by Anais Nin, “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” by Jean-Dominque Bauby (1997 Knopf edition), “Maurice” by E.M. Forster (2005 W.W. Norton edition) and “Becoming a Man” by Paul Monette, which won the 1992 National Book Award.

Michel Foucault, E.M. Forster, and Paul Monette are now porn brokers simply because they’re gay, or their books have gay characters?

I was going to wait to post this until tomorrow, but the story is flying around gay Internet users, so I’m posting this now. Amazon has a serious, and fast growing, problem on its hands.