Column: Amazon Supports Democracy Dying in Darkness

There’s something remarkably phony on the front page of every Washington Post proclaiming their motto “Democracy Dies in Darkness.” A new investigative report from Reuters found that the Post’s owners at Amazon are partners in a propaganda project with communist China.

Reuters started by revealing that Amazon banned reviewers from its Chinese website. This was to ensure that nobody could criticize a compilation of speeches given by Xi Jinping, the Chinese dictator. This was “part of a deeper, decade-long effort by the company to win favor in Beijing to protect and grow its business in one of the world’s largest marketplaces.”

China is the death of democracy.

Amazon partnered with China’s propaganda makers to create a selling portal on the company’s U.S. site, Amazon.com – a project that came to be known as China Books. Jay Carney is the ex-press secretary for Obama and Biden and is the head global of Amazon’s lobbying operations and public policy. To gain access to the Chinese boodle, they’ll put communist propaganda on global display.

Chinese government reports that Carney made a promise to an alternative member of China’s Communist Party central committee during a visit to Beijing in 2018. He said Amazon would do “everything” to help China Books grow and become stronger. Naturally, Carney wouldn’t offer any comment to the Reuters expose.

These books sound absurd. Consider the paperback “The Paperback” Incredible Xinjiang: Tales of Passion and Heritage by the “Xinhua News Agency Team.” Xinjiang province is where China interns a million ethnic Uighurs in concentration camps. But the book touts a local online comedy show in Xinjiang where an actor plays a local “country bumpkin” insists ethnicity is “not a problem” there. The communist lie that any minorities were mistreated is repeated in this book.

Then there are books that hail China’s battle against COVID-19, which began in Wuhan. The first is called Stories of Courage & Determination: Wuhan, Coronavirus Lockdown, by “The Editorial Board.” Reuters reports another book on this pandemic theme begins with commentary from Xi Jinping: “Our success to date has once again demonstrated the strengths of CPC (the Communist Party of China) leadership and Chinese socialism.”

The Amazon-owned Internet Movie Database (IMDb.com) also did Beijing’s bidding by removing harsh user comments on the documentary Amazing China, which praises the country’s accomplishments since Xi became dictator (“president”) in 2013. The film is still rated low – a 2.3 out of ten – but archived screenshots showed that some negative reviews disappeared.

Amazon replied to Reuters queries by saying that it adheres to all relevant laws and regulations wherever it operates, including China. The company stated, “As a bookseller we believe it’s important to provide access to both the written word” and other perspectives. This includes books some might find offensive.

Ah, come on! In America, Amazon has banned the sale of conservative books on the wrong side of the LGBT censors – like Sally became Harry: A response to the Transgender Moment by Ryan Anderson – but it sells preposterous Red China propaganda because it proclaims “diverse perspectives” are important.  

As we’re about to see in dazzling Technicolor display during the 2022 Olympics, so-called “woke” corporations will overlook a lot of human rights abuses in China to gain access to its enormous market. Media companies that genuflect to Chinese tyranny should take down their brave mottos or proclamations that they’re warriors for democracy and transparency and resistance…starting with The Washington Post.