TV CONTROVERSY OVER PEDOPHILE BOOK GENERATES SALES FOR IT

In yet another case of moral outrage backfiring, sales of the self-published The Pedophile’s Guide to Love and Pleasure zoomed on Amazon after it became the subject of radio and TV talk shows and cable newscasts on Wednesday. Richard Greaves, the 42-year-old author of the book, said that he had sold just one copy of the book before the controversy over it hit. However, according to Gawker.com, as of Wednesday afternoon, sales of the book had risen 101,000 percent. (Gawker notes that the content of the book, while “creepy,” is “underwhelming” and asks, “Are we being played?”) Amazon, which had initially said that it “believes it is censorship not to sell certain books simply because we or others believe their message is objectionable,” (the company does ban pornography) appeared to yank it, then restore it, then yank it again. Gawker said that as of Wednesday afternoon, it was the 65th best-selling book among Amazon’s Kindle ebooks. And Dr. Parry Aftab, head of the child-advocacy group Wired Safety, told Bloomberg News that it would be wrong for Amazon to pull the book, inasmuch as doing so would only draw more attention to it. “The more noise that people make about it, the more people will buy it,” she said.