Once again, Amazon is being put on blast for racist and anti-Semitic products that third-party sellers are funelling through the retail giant’s platform.
The nonprofit Simon Wiesenthal Centre wrote a letter to Amazon founder and executive chairman Jeff Bezos one year ago urging the massive online retailer to take down a number of anti-Semetic and neo-Nazi products and films being sold or put up for streaming on its platform. A year later, they’ll still calling on the ecommerce giant to do more to moderate what’s being sold on its site.
Amazon, alongside fellow digital shops from Google and Wish were also called out in 2020 for allowing these symbols to be sold. In a Thursday press release, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre said Amazon previously removed 20 Nazi propaganda films that were either available for sale or streaming.
Many of the movies listed by the Centre were made by Leni Riefenstahl, the infamous director of Triumph of the Will and other Nazi propaganda films created in the 1930s. Though some of the listings have been taken down, many of Riefenstahl’s movie listings still remain up. Several either come up as “out of stock,” or appear with “This video is currently unavailable to watch in your location.” All the other movies pointed out by the centre have since been removed.
Read the article by Kyle Barr on Gizmodo.