3 Companies With Terrible Policies On When It’s OK to Say ‘Gay,’ ‘Lesbian’ or ‘Fag’
APPLE (Market Cap: $146.94 billion)
Apple’s iTunes is now the largest music retailer in the United States. Selling more than just tunes, Apple’s digital store also traffics in movies, television shows, and applications and games for your iPhone. That’s a lot of control over digital media for one company, which makes its policies on gay content that much more hefty.
When it comes to Apple’s American iTunes store, there’s no ban on gay specific content. A quick search turns up plenty of gay stuff to buy:
When we searched for “fag,” however, the results including the term were censored with asterisks:
But bizarrely, the policy is reversed in Sweden. Towleroad points out things there are the other way around: “gay” content is censored,” while “fag” tunes are kosher.
I am glad to see that “fag” is treated as a curse word on these websites (other issues/words aside).
Enough with the word hysteria. If I want to ask Continental about the best fag-fisting travel options in Salt Lake City, I’d appreciate a non-judgemental response, thank you. Besides, I just like the image of a Continental employee doing research on fag-fisting, arranged by price and convenience.
Xbox Live supposedly bans any mention of any sexual orientations whatsoever in gamertags and profiles; I’ve seen users like “SatansGreasyKok” and “Ladiesman”, though, so… that’s a bit debatable.
I was on a Continental flight last summer, and the in-flight entertainment was an episode of How I Met Your Mother–the word “lesbian” in the sentence “People will think this is a lesbian bar” was bleeped out.