Walmart has pulled a T-shirt which encouraged the lynching of journalists.
The $18.99 T-shirt bearing the message ‘Rope. Tree. Journalist. SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED’ was listed on Walmart.com through third-party seller Teespring.
Walmart removed it after a journalist advocacy group told the retailer it found the shirt threatening.
Walmart has pulled a T-shirt which encouraged the lynching of journalists. Pictured: The T Shirt on the Walmart website which was
Walmart said: ‘This item was sold by a third-party seller on our marketplace and clearly violates our policy.
‘We removed it as soon as it was brought to our attention, and are conducting a thorough review of the seller’s assortment.’
Teespring, which allows people to post shirt designs, confirmed that the shirt has been pulled and said it is working to prevent such content from slipping through its filters.
‘As soon as we were alerted to this content promoting violence against journalists we removed the content, added this content to our automated scanning systems, and kicked off a human sweep of the site to find and remove any similar content,’ the company said.
In August, Teespring had removed a ‘rainbow swastika’ T-shirt from its own site and said it would increase oversight of its product line.
The Radio Television Digital News Association said Walmart notified it about five hours after its complaint that the shirt was being removed.
‘We are grateful for Walmart’s swift action, but dismayed that it, and anyone else selling the shirt, would offer such an offensive and inflammatory product,’ the group’s executive director, Dan Shelley said.
The same shirt was spotted at a rally during the presidential campaign.
Shelley wrote in an email to Walmart: ‘According to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, of which RTDNA is a founding partner, nearly three dozen journalists have been physically assaulted so far this year across the country merely for performing their Constitutionally-guaranteed duty to seek and report the truth.
‘According to our fellow press freedom advocacy group Committee to Protect Journalists, at least 48 journalists have been killed in other countries around the world thus far in 2017.
‘It is our belief that at the least, T-Shirts or any other items bearing such words simply inflame the passions of those who either don’t like, or don’t understand, the news media.
‘At worst, they openly encourage violence targeting journalists. We believe they are particularly inflammatory within the context of today’s vitriolic political and ideological environment.’