UPDATE 1:53 p.m.:
An MTA spokesperson has confirmed to BuzzFeed News that Amazon has now decided to pull all Nazi-related ads from the subway.
See original story below.
Some New Yorkers weren't too thrilled today when they boarded the subway to find their car filled with Nazi imagery as part of an ad campaign to promote the Amazon series Man in the High Castle.
The S train—the shuttle that runs between Grand Central and Times Square—had some of its seats wrapped in vinyl covers depicting a Nazi Reichsadler eagle symbol inside an American flag, Gothamist reports.
Some of the seats were also covered with a version of the World War II-era Japanese flag. Responses from upset commuters on Twitter ranged from calling the campaign "messed up," to the more dramatic "absolutely horrifying."
The Man in the High Castle is set in an alternate reality in which the Axis powers defeated the Allies in WWII, and the campaign is apparently intended to draw commuters into that world.
But fiction or not some people were disturbed, such as Ann Toback, the director of a 123-year-old American Jewish organization that works to promote social justice, who happened to take the shuttle on the first day of the campaign.
“I shouldn’t have to sit staring at a Nazi insignia on my way to work,” she told Gothamist
As Slate points out, the MTA (the entity that operates New York's subways) announced a new advertising policy earlier this year that is meant to maintain “a safe and welcoming environment for all MTA employees and customers,” and allows the MTA to block advertising that "contains material that is abusive to, or debases the dignity of, an individual or group of individuals."
Whether this type of Nazi imagery as used to promote a fictional TV series falls into that category is debatable, but an MTA spokesman told Gothamist that the MTA didn't block this particular ad because it's not political.
“[Our] updated standards prohibit political advertisements," he said. "Unless you’re saying that you believe Amazon is advocating for a Nazi takeover of the United States, then it meets the standards. They’re advertising a show."
