Sonja Denise's Notebook

Amazon is still claiming it was all an error. An embarrassing error. And I'm wondering, "where the fuck is the apology?" Still haven't heard one. Still not giving them any money (and, damn, I really want to preorder Dollhouse). An apology would, at the very least, show Amazon has enough shame to pretend to care what this looks like.

Unlikely it was a mistake: http://www.afterellen.com/node/48877

People are backing down and saying AmazonFail was overblown. What else do you expect from a country that lived under eight years of Bush and never flipped its shit?

Looks like I'll be deleting my Amazon account come Monday.

http://www.examiner.com/x-3569-Denver-Internet-Examiner~y2009m4d12-Online-censorship-Amazon-strips-ranking-of-Gay-and-Lesbian-books
Petition: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/in-protest-at-amazons-new-adult-policy

Long and short: Amazon introduced a policy that would remove "adult" books from its rankings/best seller lists and thus, general store-wide search results (so, when you search "homosexuality," you wind up with a bunch of anti-gay books). Shock and awe, a bunch of non-adult GLBT books (Heather's Two Moms, anyone?) and apparently some feminist ones have been removed, while explicit heterosexual books haven't. Once caught red-handed, Amazon claimed that this is a glitch. Yeah. Uh-huh. Anyone with two braincells to rub together can tell it's intentional.

After reading this, I kept thinking, didn't someone pull similar shit like this, down to claiming "glitch"? And then I remembered - it was LiveJournal.

And I was just about to pre-order Dollhouse on DVD. But I guess Amazon isn't as interested in making money as much as it is in discriminating.

I've never been a big Obama fan. I never believed he was liberal, and always pegged him for center-right. I never thought the election of a black man signified anything except now minorities can get fucked over by our own kind. Maybe I'm cynical because that's my nature, or because I've been subjected to the Bush clusterfuck from the moment I became fully politically aware up until now. But all I ever saw Obama as was More Of The Same - a rich, detached politician who cared more about climbing a political ladder rather than actually helping anyone. Oh, he's smart, but his intelligence won't help us any.

I've been following the Rick Warren drama for the past few days, but haven't really bothered to say much about it, because it's pretty standard for Obama or any other politician without any real convictions. Or a Democrat. I and other true liberals are pissed. Some are getting disillusioned (the more, the better, I say). Then there are those Obamafreaks who think he's God or something, and insist that we all continue to trust him despite him repeatedly showing that's not such a great plan. But this rant isn't about them, or even specifically about Obama.

( This gets long. )

I've been slowly making my way through Grey's Anatomy (I'm still somewhere in Season 3); the show is so soapy and trashy and doesn't even try to pretend it isn't, and I have to give thumbs up to Shonda Rhimes for having such a diverse cast. It's the only show I know of right now that portrays a broader range of looks as being beautiful and there's no "Hollywood ugly" nonsense.

Okay, I admit it, I'm mainly watching for Cristina. But I had to point out the positives of the show.

Amid the Election frenzy, I missed out on the news that Brooke Smith was suddenly dropped from the show, and her character, Erica Hahn, is being written out (and rather half-assed, apparently), and it's apparently ABC's doing. Which is not surprising, since I'd have a hard time believing Rhimes would do this. Let's see, what are Erica Hahn's offenses? She's a strong woman, perhaps not attractive enough by some arbitrary standards, and, oh, she's in a relationship Callie, another woman! And on top of that, there was apparently going to be another bisexual character, but the scripts are being rewritten.

Jesus H. Christ, this is depressing to hear after all those bigoted ballot measures passed. It feels like we're really moving backwards in a scary way.

I'm having flashbacks to how The 4400 dropped Samantha Ferris (she played a strong woman, but a rather minor character) without warning or reason. The show got canceled the following season. I'm hoping Grey's ratings drop noticeably so ABC realizes that they fucked up big time.

Here's the best commentary I've read about the situation so far.

"Jesus affirmed a gay couple." Along with a few other passages, with support. Once again, the crappy (and near-senseless) translation that most Christians are reading distorts everything.

And, seriously, like Jesus would be so petty.