The Wal-Mart Thought Police

"Wal-Mart, America's largest retailer, prides itself on being a 'family-friendly' store, with smiley faces guiding stressed-out breadwinners to a land of low-cost, guilt-free consumption," writes Amy Schiller. But it has become "the self-appointed culture police by screening the music, books and magazines that many Americans will be able to access. ... Take, for example, Wal-Mart's refusal to sell Sheryl Crow's self-titled album in 1996, citing objections to a lyric that criticized Wal-Mart for selling handguns. ... The huge bestseller, America: the Book, featuring Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, and the rest of the Daily Show crew, was banned from Wal-Mart in 2004." Wal-Mart also refused to carry Robert Greenwald's documentary, "Uncovered: The Whole Truth About the Iraq War." Even "something as potentially broadly appealing, positive, and utterly non-offensive as a T-shirt reading 'Someday a woman will be president' was pulled from the sales floor because 'the message goes against Wal-Mart family values.'"