Unbalanced TV Coverage to Gay Stories
TV news coverage, at least by some stations in San Diego, is notoriously unbalanced in the coverage of issues involving major, gay civil rights issues like gay marriages.
When the San Diego City Council recently voted to file an amicus curiae (friend-of-the-court) brief in support of gay mar-riages in a case currently before the California Supreme Court,
San Diego’s Mayor Jerry Sanders – who spoke out against gay mar-riages during his mayoral campaign – said he would veto the measure.
In a surprise move, however, he suddenly and emotionally re-versed himself and announced that he would sign the council’s reso-lution and support gay marriages.
He was literally in tears and had difficulty speaking as he an-nounced his dramatic reversal on the issue. He explained that his daughter was a Lesbian; his press secretary, Fred Sainz, and several others on his staff were Gay; and that they deserved the same happi-ness and rights as do straight couples.
Mayor Sanders is a republican and his conservative supporters were aghast.
When the hot-button story was covered by some of the local TV stations, they interviewed several anti-Gay religious leaders for their reactions, but did not interview any pro-Gay religious lead-ers.
Their coverage was not balanced.
Some would argue that it is a responsibility of the leaders of the Gay Community to raise this objection. Well, I am Gay and a co-founder of the now worldwide Gay Liberation movement, as well as a life-long journalist.
Our SPJ Code of Ethics require that we be “fair,” and to “tell the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience, even when it is unpopular to do so.”
It is especially important on a controversial story such as gay marriage.
Many politicians say they do not favor gay marriage, but do support “civil unions” (called “domestic partnerships” in Califor-nia). But, the differences in the legal rights of those two catego-ries are numerous and enormous. Does TV news clarify that? Rarely, at least in San Diego.