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Airbrushing history.

The Stamp Collecting Report, I'm Lloyd de Vries.

eBay is joining the rush to ban sales of Confederate flag items, in the wake of the
Charleston church shooting. Stamp collectors are wondering how it might affect them.

Some U-S stamps do show the Confederate flag... such as the set of STATE flag stamps
for the Bicentennial. Will these 39-year-old stamps be banned from the site?

One specialty within stamp collecting is Civil War Patriotics – the envelopes from 150
years ago showing support for one side or the other. Will Confederate Patriotics still
be allowed? How about old picture postcards, or new commemorative envelopes for this
year’s Civil War anniversary stamps.

Don’t laugh and dismiss this as a paranoid fantasy: At times, eBay has banned stamps that
show Adolph Hitler or the swastika. That eliminates practically every German stamp issued
during a 12-year period! One dealer who specializes in Germany told me she was suspended
from eBay over this.

Ban sales of modern merchandise that glorifies racism, sure. But stamp collecting is a
hobby that often glorifies history… and history sometimes isn’t as pretty as we’d like.

I'm Lloyd de Vries of The Virtual Stamp Club. For more on stamps and stamp collecting,
visit virtual-stamp-club-dot-com.

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