Amazon Temporarily Blocked Advertisement for Book That Links BLM to Marxism

Protesters rally outside the Brooklyn Center police station in Brooklyn Center, Minn., on April 13, 2021. Kerem Yucel/AFP via Getty Images

The Heritage Foundation on Thursday alleged that it has been temporarily blocked from advertising and promoting on Amazon a new book about the Marxist ideological root of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) organization.

In a news release, the Washington, D.C.-based think tank said it was informed by Amazon that its advertisement for the book “BLM: The Making of a New Marxist Revolution” failed to comply with the online retailer’s policy because it contained “content that is not allowed.”

“Content that revolves around controversial or highly debated social topics is not permitted,” said Amazon in a message to Heritage. “Please remove this content from your ad.”

Heritage said in an update that it has won the appeal of the decision, and was notified that it was the result of “human error.”

“Whether this was the result of an algorithm or human action, the outcome is censorship,” Heritage concluded.

The book, which tops Amazon’s “Black & African American History” category at the time of this article’s publication, is written by Mike Gonzalez, a veteran journalist and senior fellow at Heritage. Gonzalez condemned Amazon for allegedly trying to limit the reach of the book, but also noted that this very attempt reveals how important his work is.

“I wrote this book because most of the press refused to cover the important questions about the people and organizations behind Black Lives Matter,” Gonzalez said. “The American people deserve answers to those questions, especially after the 630 or more riots that left our cities burning, businesses destroyed and billions in damage, and Americans dead.”

Gonzalez also questioned whether Amazon would treat books written by Nikole Hannah-Jones or Ibram X. Kendi the same way under the same standard about controversial content. Hannah-Jones is the leading author of The New York Times’ highly controversial “1619 Project,” an essay collection that portrays the United States as an inherently racist nation founded to protect slavery. Kendi, a professor at Boston University, advocates for active discrimination against racial groups that are deemed “privileged” as a remedy for historical racism.

“I have to wonder if Nikole Hannah-Jones’s and Ibram X. Kendi’s books face similar constraints,” he said.

BLM’s official website originally described its founder Alicia Garza as a “trained Marxist” and said the organization did advocate for the dissolution of the traditional family structure, as did Karl Marx, notoriously, in the Communist Manifesto. Those messages, however, have since been removed from the site.

“We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages’ that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable,” it stated.

Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.