CULTURE. The publisher of Robert F. Kennedy’s book, The Real Anthony Fauci, Skyhorse Publishing, tried to place a full-page ad in The New York Times — and here’s what happened.
At first the ad salesman was thrilled we wanted to place the ad — until he understood what the book was about.
When he saw the actual ad, he informed us he would have to run it by “Standards Management.”
“Standards,” which I’d never heard of during my 27 years in the publishing field, got back to him with the following:
“We don’t need to look into the accuracy of the book, but the ad itself needs to be non-defamatory and accurate.
Can you ask for substantiation on the claims made in the ad, specifically, the ‘many, many untruths emanating from Fauci and minions’ over ‘decades.’ Also the claim about boycotts, censorship and media blackout.”
To jump to the end of the story:
The advertising rep emailed us this note:
“I just heard back from Standards Management and was told that we can’t accept the ad due to misinformation.”
They refused to indicate which part of the advertisement constituted misinformation, but they made it clear their decision was based on the original ad, the one they had already run.
It appears senior management at The New York Times had simply decided that, regardless of their policies, they didn’t want to run even the same ad again for a book that accused the most powerful public official in the country not only of lying to the American people but also of committing the most reprehensible form of corruption possible — the kind that costs people their lives.
“The Real Anthony Fauci” has now sold more than 1,000,000 copies in all formats, but there’s no telling how many it would have sold if it hadn’t been subjected to the most thorough censorship of any book in recent American history.
By Julie Aubrey, Revealed Films (A link for the full NYT ad story)