It seems as if everybody on social media is talking about boycotting big companies perceived to be cozying up to Trump.
To make one thing clear: we (TB and Miranda) are not fans of Jeff Bezos. In fact, we don’t believe it’s possible for anyone to be an ethical billionaire because that level of wealth concentration within society is inherently wrong.
We get why people are angry with Amazon. Not simply for the way Bezos has bent over for Trump. There are many things wrong with Amazon as a corporation. This post isn’t a defense of Bezos or Amazon. It is a plea for readers not to turn their backs on a vulnerable group of sapphic authors whose livelihoods, through no fault of their own, depend on Amazon.
Some Important Sapphic Publishing History
Back in the dark ages (less than 20 years ago), if you wanted to be an author, you had to write query letters to agents and publishers and then wait months or years while your book baby sat in the slush pile awaiting review (and, 9 times out of 10, rejection). In 2006, Miranda attended a writing conference in which a major topic of conversation was the best paper to use when printing and mailing out copies of your 300-page manuscript.
In November 2007, Kindle Direct Publishing was born. Seven years later, Amazon unveiled Kindle Unlimited. Since then, a revolution has taken place across the publishing industry as a whole, but especially in sapphic fiction. Not only are sapphic authors able to publish their stories without gatekeepers, but a growing number of those authors are turning writing into a full-time career. This was nearly unheard of before Amazon’s 70% royalty rate and Kindle Unlimited page-read compensation came along.
When we were younger (more than 20 years ago), it was nearly impossible to find queer books. Those that were published came from small presses and could only be found in niche bookshops or through the mail. We were both in our 20s before we encountered our first sapphic book “in the wild.” (Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters, which you could buy in an airport!) Even in the early days of I Heart SapphFic, (less than a decade ago), TB was lucky to find a handful of books to feature every Tuesday in the IHS New Release newsletter.
Fast forward to today. IHS features 25-35 new releases every week, and that’s only a portion of what is being released. The IHS BookFinder database has well over 8,000 sapphic books, and that doesn’t capture even half of the titles that are now available. We’re adding more each day.
The Economic Reality of Being a Full-time Sapphic Author
Most authors, even those who publish through small sapphic presses or indies who have opted out of KU, report around 80% of their sales coming from Amazon. It is the largest book platform by far. And for those who enroll their ebooks in KU, it is the only platform because those books must be exclusive to Amazon. The vast majority of the authors IHS works with who earn a full-time income are enrolled in KU, which accounts for more than 50% of their income. This is not a fun hobby for some spare cash. These authors pay their rent, buy food, save for retirement, and support their families with this money.
Miranda, for example, is a single mother of two daughters. Her ex has been out of work for nearly 3 years, meaning Miranda is the only provider for her children. She has been self-employed for several years. Having her writing career destroyed would be catastrophic. Dozens of indie authors have shared variations on this theme over the past week.
Why Isn’t IHS Adding Other Buy Buttons Aside from Amazon?
The simple answer: we can’t afford it. We’ve already invested tens of thousands of dollars into IHS.
The longer answer is complicated, and we looked into this at the beginning when designing the website.
- We use Amazon affiliate money to fund a significant amount of the website.
- We can’t get affiliate money from Apple because they keep turning down our applications. Other affiliate options would be peanuts.
- It would cost us thousands of dollars to retool the website, and we’re tapped out.
- It would take thousands of hours to research, create, and add all the links in a database with over 8,500 books. This is a completely manual process.
- It would take hours of maintenance each week to ensure every link still works. Authors are constantly changing things, and we already spend several hours each week simply updating book covers and blurbs.
- We want to be able to keep offering our features for free for readers and authors.
How Much Commission Could You Possibly Make on Books?
More than you think, because it isn’t just books.
Through the Amazon Affiliate program, IHS earns a small commission every time you click a book link on our site. But not just on the books you buy. Virtually every product you order during your visit to their site qualifies, meaning that we have earned money for anything from baby carrots to computers. It adds up. Without those commissions, IHS would be nowhere close to covering our expenses, and we would face some very hard choices in what services, if any, we could continue to provide for readers and authors.
We should mention that it is very likely IHS will go away if we can no longer afford to fund it, especially if our writing income dwindles. And lest you think we are being alarmist, we are already seeing the effects of people turning away from Amazon in the form of lower affiliate income, fewer sales, and reduced KU page reads.
We Are in Danger of Hurting the Sapphic Book Community Beyond Repair
With the new administration and the goals of Project 2025, we’ve been fearful since November of losing our ability to publish our stories. Our biggest fear used to be that LGBTQ+ content or spicy romance of any type could be banned. We figured we would at least have some time to make contingency plans while cases slowly wound their way through the legal system.
But it’s our own community boycotting Amazon that sends shivers through us now. We never thought the sapphic book community would be the ones to destroy our own genre, but that is a real fear. And it could happen very fast. We already know of popular sapphic authors who are circulating their resumes, looking for a non-writing-related day job, out of concern that they will not be able to make a living much longer.
Like it or not (we do not), there is no financially viable alternative at this time for Amazon-exclusive authors who depend on their monthly income to survive. No other platform has the reach, and growing a following on entirely new platforms takes years. Rent is due every month. By the time some new alternative might emerge, it will be too late to save many authors the community loves.
This doesn’t mean only Amazon-exclusive authors are in a tough spot. Even the ones whose publishers have a web store of their own depend on Amazon—a small press simply can’t generate the same kind of traffic. Their newsletters can’t keep up with Amazon sending out an email to their huge customer base.
Amazon has 310 million customers worldwide! No publisher, especially not the small sapphic presses, can replace that kind of reach on their own.
When we have pointed out these concerns in response to the flurry of recent social media posts promoting long-term boycotts of Amazon, some people have actually told authors they should be willing, even happy, to sacrifice their livelihoods for the greater good.
We have to wonder, would the people saying this be happy to lose their own jobs to prove a point? Or do they mean authors aren’t valuable enough to society to expect to earn a living wage and need to get a “real” job?
But Isn’t It Worth it if an Amazon Boycott Ends Fascism?
That isn’t how boycotts, or fascism, work. But let’s pretend for a minute that this outcome is possible just through voting with our dollars. We would have to hit Amazon pretty hard. But if we can convince everyone we know not to shop at Amazon until they stand up to stop Trump, they’d have to feel the squeeze and get desperate, right?
Not really.
Amazon’s retail store is only a small portion of the company. Services like Kindle Unlimited are actually seen as loss-leaders, meaning they cost Amazon more than they bring in.
Most of the items you buy from Amazon are not their own products. They are listed by third-party sellers who make their living through Amazon’s marketplace in return for a percentage fee. Just like indie authors and publishers. These are the people who will be most hurt when you refuse to buy products, read books, and cancel your Amazon Prime.
Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amazon’s cloud-computing platform, on the other hand, is the real powerhouse of Amazon’s wealth. This is where their profit comes from. In case you are thinking we should just boycott all the companies who use AWS to power their businesses, here is a partial list of the over 2 million we would need to boycott:
Netflix
ESPN
Warner Bros. Discovery
The Walt Disney Company
Sony Pictures
HBO
Discovery
Universal Music Group
Turner Broadcasting
BBC
Epic Games
Meta (Facebook)
X (Twitter)
Bluesky
AirBnB
Canva
GoDaddy
Coca-Cola
Heineken
McDonald’s
NASA
Please note this list isn’t close to being exhaustive, even if you feel exhausted reading it.
We’re not listing these companies to say you should boycott any of them. We’re doing so to show you how embedded Amazon is in everyday life.
Does Ethical Consumption Exist?
It’s striking that we’re seeing so many of these conversations about boycotting Amazon on Facebook. Not only is Facebook on the list of AWS customers, but it is actually complicit in a genocide. Not to mention allowing nefarious organizations to target users with ads to fuel culture wars. The company was caught red-handed for selling user data to Cambridge Analytica.
Facebook’s algorithms favor rage-inducing posts, e.g., anti-immigrant, anti-LGBTQ, etc. content, and FB does little to nothing to stop all the hate and misinformation.
Again, we’re not saying you should boycott Facebook. There are few places where so many sapphic readers can come together to share their love of books. It takes time to build a community, and once a group disperses, it may be gone for good.
We also don’t think you should boycott Shopify, the platform many indie authors use to sell their books direct, even though they’ve greatly relaxed their free speech to the point that some vendors are literally selling Nazi merchandize.
Substack, a newsletter service some authors use, has also had an ongoing Nazi problem.
Then there’s Spotify, where you can get audiobooks. Spotify’s CEO praised AI and said there will come a time when they won’t need human artists.
Let’s not forget about Ingram, a printing and distribution company that most small presses and indie authors use to get their books into bookstores. It’s also where indie bookstores get their books from. Ingram is owned by a billionaire family who has donated tons of money to the GOP too.
Almost every company we use to make a living in late-stage capitalism has serious ethical issues. Expecting every marketplace and brand that we use to pass a purity test is an impossible standard if you don’t want to opt out of the economy entirely.
The True Plague in Modern Society
What we have is a billionaire problem. We the people need to shout this from the rooftops. We need to demand that our political representatives stand up to them. Tax them. Curtail their ability to buy elections. Take away their enormous power. The political change that must happen to keep fascism from swallowing up not only the USA but the world, is immense. But we must do the hard work ourselves.
- Attend protests
- Go to town hall meetings
- Vote in every election you can
- Talk to the people in your life about how issues impact you
Yes, the Republicans are in charge of both the House and Senate. But there is nothing scarier to representatives with the power than to be confronted with a pissed-off mob. The Republican majority is slim, meaning only a few would have to be persuaded to stop Trump from steamrolling into full-on authoritarianism. The threat of being primaried for disobeying his wishes loses its teeth when it becomes clear that the people will vote them out of office in a heartbeat if they follow his commands.
Call your representatives (for Americans, the U.S. Capitol switchboard is 202-224-3121. Tell them where you live so they can connect you to your representatives and senators.) Call them every single day, especially if they do not agree with you politically.
None of us want to go back to a time where you can’t find sapphic books. Please think long and hard about the unintended consequences of boycotting a company that literally supports our community, especially since the loss of your business won’t even hurt them. Force politicians to act. They are the ones with the power to actually do something. We have checks and balances in the US. We need the legislative branch to do their fucking jobs.
Vote and hold your representatives to account. Take to the streets if you must. Don’t be silenced.
