David Lammy called Amazon out for using the N-word to describe a pair of shoes

David Lammy has criticised Amazon for selling a pair of shoes which are described as “n***** brown”.

He tweeted last night how buying a pair of shoes now leads to a racist micro-aggression. He said: “Just buying brown brogues tonight leads to this racist micro aggression. Is it 2020 or 1720? Please ⁦⁦@amazon take it down.”

David also shared a screenshot of the shoes along with their product description. Amazon has since removed the shoes from their site and said all their sellers must follow guidelines.

They said: “All sellers must follow our selling guidelines and those who do not will be subject to action including potential removal of their account. The product in question is no longer available.”

David thanked Amazon on Twitter for removing the shoes but questioned why they were allowed to be sold in the first place.

He tweeted: “Thank you @amazon for taking this down now but given the item has been on sale since March what systems do you have in place for reviewing descriptions and not allowing offensive terms to be posted in the first place? This is not the first time.”

During the Black Lives Matter movement in June Amazon were called out for continuing to sell racist products including children’s books that also contain the N-word.

Featured image credit: David Woolfall/ Creative Commons Licence 

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