Sink America Online

In recent months, certain members of America Online (hereinafter referred to as AOL) have noted, with increasing alarm, that AOL is targeting some of its own subscribers in a very discriminatory manner, in clear violation of its own Terms of Service.

AOL's Terms of Service clearly states that members may not be discriminated against due to anything such as age, gender, religion, ethnicity, etc. and many people in the Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgender community (hereinafter referred to as the GLBT community) have maintained AOL accounts over the years, believing sincerely that AOL's Terms of Service is there to protect them from abuse, harassment and the like as well; i.e. that they, too, are not going to be discriminated against.

This, however, is unfortunately not the case, as recent months have shown. More and more people in the GLBT community -- as well as their supporters -- have noticed messages disappearing from public message boards and getting TOS warnings from the Community Action Team (hereinafter referred to as CAT). Certain members of the GLBT community and their supporters -- including the author of this petition, one such supporter -- have had their accounts terminated by AOL and have even been banned from using the service.

Their crimes? Simply being gay, or supporting gay rights. Approximately 99\% of all messages on The Gay Marriage Debate message board which are deleted originate with GLBT members and their supporters; less than 1\% of those messages on the same board which are deleted are posted by homophobes. Members of the GLBT community online have kept careful track of the daily "traffic" on the board and of which messages stay vs. which get deleted and whose they are so these are verifiable facts.

AOL charges an average of $23.95 per month, or $287.40 per annum, for the use of its services. When one has an account with Hotmail, Yahoo!, Juno or other ISPs, one need not pay anything for the purpose of e-mail, Instant Messaging or chat.

So who needs AOL, if they are going to target people who are in the GLBT community and those who support them, and protect homophobes? Is this any way to run an Internet service?

We intend to give AOL a message they'll never forget. We who have AOL are pulling our accounts so we will use free ISP services from now on; and will, together with those of us who do not have AOL, keep spreading the word, until AOL issues a formal apology to the GLBT community and its supporters.