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http://msnbc.com/news/909884.asp?0cv=CB20&cp1=1

ASSOCIATED PRESS

NEW YORK, May 6 — Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. has pulled the men’s magazines Maxim, Stuff and FHM from its shelves, deeming them too racy for its customers. The retail giant made the decision after hearing opinions from customers and associates, Melissa Berryhill, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman told The New York Times in Tuesday’s editions.
The halt in sales is part of a series of moves by Wal-Mart to pull back on items that it considers too risque. Maxim, Stuff and FHM often feature starlets posing on the cover and in layouts with little clothing.

In the past, the company has been pressured by Christian groups over its distributing certain magazines. Wal-Mart can account for up to 15 percent of all single copy magazine sales. But Wal-Mart accounts for less than three percent of newsstand sales for Maxim and Stuff, said Stephen Colvin, president of Dennis Publishing which owns both magazines.

“I don’t think that these decisions are often rational; they are subjective. For any men’s magazine to put a woman on the cover seems a bit troubling to them,” he said.

Oy, those fundies...

I suppose I should be glad Target Corporation isn't the #1 retailer in the country - if they were, they'd be subject to the same kind of ridiculous demands (well, maybe a little less - they have the advantage of NOT being based in the Bible Belt).

Remember the first rule of the Christian Right: if it excites you, it must be EEEVIIIILLLLL!!!!

Oh, it gets better. The "God Gundam" and "Devil Gundam" were renamed in the US version of Mobile Fighter G Gundam (the Shining Gundam II and Dark Gundam) because some intrepid Good Christian Soldier(tm) in Wal-Mart's shipping/receiving department made the decision to open ALL of the Gundam Wing shipments and to pick out and send back every last Gundam Deathscythe Hell figure and model kit.

And yet they didn't pull the Gundam Epyon, which ARGUABLY looks far more evil.

Wal-Mart itself is evil. They even censor the CD's that you buy there.

This decision comes as no surprise.

Is Wal-Mart the one people were complaining about before on this board?

Um ... WalMart have a rather sizable portion of their stores dedicated to the sale of firearms and ammunition. I'm sensing some hypocrisy here.

Welcome to what we Mart-slaves refer to as 'Bentonville Logic'. I see it ever friggen day at work......

If its even the least bit fun, its bad. The Walton clan are for the most part devout Baptists, and all to often these decisions are the result of comments from Ray Walton(Sams eldest son) to Tom Coughlin our CEO. Even though no Waltons sit on the board any longer, the company by-laws still make there word law within the company.

Yet they still sell games like GTA and such....

Gandalf wrote:Is Wal-Mart the one people were complaining about before on this board?

Ah yes , you don't yet have Wal-Mart in Australia, just wait we'll be there soon. Then you can kiss all your mom and pop retailers goodbye, along with your local grocery stores, which will eiether become upscale snob catering stores, or die slow painful deaths as Wal-Mart undercuts every single item, and pressures their suppliers to 'have shipping problems' to your local independant retailer.

Durandal wrote:Um ... WalMart have a rather sizable portion of their stores dedicated to the sale of firearms and ammunition. I'm sensing some hypocrisy here.

There's no hypocrisy. According to the far right, guns=good and sex=bad.

Sokar wrote:

Gandalf wrote:Is Wal-Mart the one people were complaining about before on this board?

Ah yes , you don't yet have Wal-Mart in Australia, just wait we'll be there soon. Then you can kiss all your mom and pop retailers goodbye, along with your local grocery stores, which will eiether become upscale snob catering stores, or die slow painful deaths as Wal-Mart undercuts every single item, and pressures their suppliers to 'have shipping problems' to your local independant retailer.

We have K-Mart and Target, and an Australian one called Big- W, and I'll die defending it.

Wal-Mart is hell. It's a ghetto for shoppers who aren't rich.

AdmiralKanos wrote:Wal-Mart is hell. It's a ghetto for shoppers who aren't rich.

You should try working there, I'll be so happy when Im done with school and can tell them all to kiss my ass.

Sokar wrote:

AdmiralKanos wrote:Wal-Mart is hell. It's a ghetto for shoppers who aren't rich.

You should try working there, I'll be so happy when Im done with school and can tell them all to kiss my ass.

You have my sympathy. It looks like a shitty place to work.

*blink*

Er, what? Why the heck would they stop selling these magazines? If they are going to do this, then they are going to have to stop selling Vogue, Cosmopolitan, et cetera, as they have just as 'racy' covers as does Maxim...

Sokar wrote:

Gandalf wrote:Is Wal-Mart the one people were complaining about before on this board?

Ah yes , you don't yet have Wal-Mart in Australia, just wait we'll be there soon. Then you can kiss all your mom and pop retailers goodbye, along with your local grocery stores, which will eiether become upscale snob catering stores, or die slow painful deaths as Wal-Mart undercuts every single item, and pressures their suppliers to 'have shipping problems' to your local independant retailer.

The town to the east and north of me both have Wal-Marts, yet local business is doing quite well, and hasn't seen much of a decline. Sure, a couple stores are gone, but not many. Both of these are small towns, one with pretty large Wal-Mart, too. Alot of it depends on the town. If the denizens always go to Wal-Mart and stop going anywhere else, then they are dooming themselves.

Fuck Wal-Mart. I feel like fucked over or something. It's alright for the women to have thier damn magazines, which *gasp* show OTHER women on the cover all dolled up. A man's magazine though. Hell NO. Fuck em. Fuck them and thier god damned censored CDs. Seriously, why would I buy a fucking KoRn CD from those bastards? Because thier cheaper? Hell, you can EASILY go to TARGET and get (which I have for a number of albums, including Godsmacks new release 'Faceless') them just as cheap (which is cheaper than the overpriced Music Warehouse or FYE) and they are NOT censored. So let them take thier god damned magazines off the shelf. They can stuff them up thier cotton candy ass alongside thier fucking censored for your protection CDs. Assholes.

Do they seriously censor CD's?

Can they even legally do that?

Gandalf wrote:Do they seriously censor CD's?

Can they even legally do that?

Wal-Mart dosen't do the censoring itself, but any album with 'offensive' content that refuses to change the lyrics , Wal-Mart will then refuse to sell the CD. Wal-Mart is the countrys largest CD retailer, outrselling FYE, Best Buy and Music Wharehouse by a mile, so record companies put an assload of pressure on artists to rehash a Wal-Mart friendly version of the record.

I'm surprised no one has leapt up to defend the practice by saying "artists must realize that actions have consequences", the way they do for the Dixie Chicks boycott.

AdmiralKanos wrote:

Durandal wrote:Um ... WalMart have a rather sizable portion of their stores dedicated to the sale of firearms and ammunition. I'm sensing some hypocrisy here.

There's no hypocrisy. According to the far right, guns=good and sex=bad.

Have anybody here seen Zardoz?? You reminded me of a scene in that movie, where the title character (a gigantic floating stone head) says: "THE GUN IS GOOD. THE PENIS IS EVIL."

Sokar wrote:Wal-Mart dosen't do the censoring itself, but any album with 'offensive' content that refuses to change the lyrics , Wal-Mart will then refuse to sell the CD. Wal-Mart is the countrys largest CD retailer, outrselling FYE, Best Buy and Music Wharehouse by a mile, so record companies put an assload of pressure on artists to rehash a Wal-Mart friendly version of the record.

Another reason only to listen to underground music, which usually only can be bought in underground retail stores.

To an underground artist, political correctness means NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING!! (In fact, some bands see offensiveness as a virtue)

So what’s the big deal? All I see hear is a major business making changes to attract customers and make more money.

Durandal wrote:Um ... WalMart have a rather sizable portion of their stores dedicated to the sale of firearms and ammunition. I'm sensing some hypocrisy here.

Of course not. Guns can do the Lord's good work of spreading misery and oppression.


Seriously, what is it with the fundies? I have no problem with them living a life of denial and self imposed suffering but why do they have to take everyone with them? Is a racy magazine (that isn't very racy) really going to steal your poor little kids soul? It's ridiculous for them to force this on everyone.

But then again Wal-Mart's made a business off these people so I'm not suprised they're cowtowing to the fundies.

You don´t need to fear the evil Walmart empire if you just protect yourself with an grueling domestic competition.

In germany, Walmart started 5 years ago by overtaking a profitable local chain and since then managed to:

-barely keep their market share (5%)
-while selling their entire product range underpriced (illegal in germany for anything but short periods)
-produce 100mil loss in the first year
-double their loss every year arriving at about 2bill now
-wasting 9 general region managers.

And during all this they pull of the astounding feat of STILL having on average 10% higher prices than their main local competitors, who work highly profitable by the way.