Amazon customers will no longer be able to buy child sex dolls from the world’s largest online retailer.
The online shopping company has removed all anatomically correct child sex dolls that have been sold on its website for years, the National Center on Sexual Exploitation, or NCSE, announced Friday.
“While Amazon is to be commended for finally removing many of these dolls, the company is still profiting from sexual exploitation, with at least a dozen dolls with child-like faces on adult bodies still for sale,” Dawn Hawkins, NCSE senior vice president, said in a statement.
Rep. Dan Donovan, R-N.Y., who introduced a bill in December to ban the importation and distribution of silicone child sex dolls in the United States, has been pushing the retailer to ban these items.
“Amazon made the right decision in removing child sex dolls from its site. Since I introduced the CREEPER Act last year to ban child sex dolls in the United States, I’ve had very productive conversations with Amazon, and I’m glad they took this step forward. These sick, exploitative dolls have no place in our communities, and I’ll continue pushing for their outright ban,” Donovan said in a statement to the Washington Examiner.
The New York lawmaker wrote a letter to the company in February asking it remove one specific listing.
“These awful dolls endanger our children by providing near-real life training for the worst among us to target the most vulnerable among us. Once a child sex abuser tires of practicing on a doll, it’s a small step to move on to an innocent child,” Donovan wrote. “In fact, emerging psychology on the topic says these obscure dolls encourage abuse of real children.”
Amazon responded one day later on Feb. 9 and said it removed the one item, which was manufactured by a Chinese company.
NCSE said the issue is a moral one that falls in line with complaints women and men have waged about sexual misconduct in Congress and Hollywood.
“In today’s #MeToo culture, where sexual harassment and assault are rampant, corporations like Amazon have a renewed corporate responsibility to refrain from normalizing or promoting material that promotes sexual exploitation,” Hawkins said. “We request that Amazon … evaluate whether or not they will continue to contribute to a culture that treats women and children as mere sex objects.“
The organization said it now wants Amazon to “refrain from normalizing or promoting material that promotes sexual exploitation,” including items that portray child nudity and pornographic magazines.
Donovan’s bill, the Curbing Realistic Exploitative Electronic Pedophilic Robots Act, is waiting to be picked up by a House committee.
The legislation is similar to laws in Australia and the United Kingdom. It was endorsed by child and ethics advocacy groups, including Safe Horizon, Stop Abuse Campaign, Stop Child Predators, Foundation for Responsible Robotics, and Campaign Against Sex Robots.
