An Arkansas woman has shamed a US chain that used a 'family shield' to hide a magazine cover showing Elton John, his partner and their baby.
Jennifer Huddleston was shopping at the food store, Harps, when she noticed that copies of the magazine US Weekly had been obscured with a cardboard sign at all cash registers.
"Family Shield. To protect young Harps shoppers," the sign read.
On closer inspection, Ms Huddleston noticed the supposedly offensive magazine cover bore an image of Elton John and his partner David Furnish proudly holding their surrogate son, Zachary.
She took a picture of the magazine on the stand and posted it to Twitter, directing her message to various high profile media personalities.
"This was taken at my local grocery store. I was shocked. Can you help bring attention to this?" she tweeted.
Ms Huddleston tweeted numerous times about the store, adding the shop's phone number in later messages.
The move was not popular with all of her followers, with one user named @Keekalockaleah slamming the move.
"Shame on you for posting their phone # if anybody that works at this store gets hurt I hope you are ready for the consequences," the user posted.
However, the subsequent publicity seemed to have an effect, as the Harps store removed the family shields the next day.
"They took the "family shields" off of the mags with Elton on the cover. Thank you internet!," posted an elated Ms Huddleston to one of the journalists to whom she'd sent the picture.
The Sydney Morning Herald published a statement from Harps, apologising for the incident.
"When this was brought to our management's attention, the decision was changed and the magazine was uncovered," CEO Roger Collins reportedly told the SMH.
"Both our employees and our customers come in all shapes and sizes, beliefs and preferences," he said.
"Harps has never and would never discriminate. We are sorry that these events caused misunderstandings."
