Simon and Schuster Receives Backlash from Milo Yiannopoulos Book Deal
By: Christina Mancuso Jan. 05, 2017
Milo Yiannopoulos - leader of the alt-right, a racist, misogynist far-right movement, recently signed a book deal with Simon & Schuster for a $250,000 advance, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
The response has been outrage. The Chicago Review of Books has declared not to review any Simon & Schuster books in 2017. Pulitzer-prize winner Karen Hunter tweeted that she was "rethinking" her relationship with the company, and Washington Post journalist Wesley Lowery promised to boycott Simon & Schuster books.
Simon & Schuster took to Twitter in defense, saying:
We do not and have never condoned discrimination or hate speech in any form. At Simon & Schuster we have always published books by a wide range of authors with greatly varying, and frequently controversial opinions, and appealing to many different audiences of readers. While we are cognizant that many may disagree vehemently with the books we publish we note that the opinions expressed therein belong to our authors, and do not reflect either a corporate viewpoint or the views of our employees.
Milo Yiannopoulos is a British journalist, entrepreneur, public speaker, and technology editor for Breitbart News, a far-right news and opinion website based in the United States. He wrote previously using the pseudonym Milo Andreas Wagner.
Yiannopoulos founded The Kernel, an online tabloid magazine about technology, which he sold to Daily Dot Media in 2014. He rose to notability that year when he began to provide media coverage and commentary surrounding the Gamergate controversy. As a "cultural libertarian" and "free speech fundamentalist", he is a vocal critic of third-wave feminism, Islam, social justice, political correctness, and other movements and ideologies he deems authoritarian or belonging to the "regressive left". Yiannopoulos has been called a spokesperson for the alt-right. He considers himself a reporter of and sympathizer with the movement. He was permanently banned from Twitter in July 2016 for what the company cited as "inciting or engaging in the targeted abuse or harassment of others"
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