Monday, February 12, 2007
Really Shitty, Homophobic Journalism
Read it, bitch.
First of all, let's talk photo. It's a shot of a young, not unattractive 20-something walking to his therapist's--at night, across a parking lot, after the rain. He's wearing a leather jacket. If not for the bright lights, which suggest a film or music video set (or sexual surveillance), one might think this young closet case is out cruising.
That's just funny. More to the point, this article is yet another example of the so-called liberal media bending over backwards to cater to their staunchest critics--people whom reporters are no doubt tired of hearing bitch and complain--by "triangulating" between the accepted scientific consensus and an ideologically driven, archconservative fiction. This is perfectly analogous to taking seriously a Chevron-funded think tank that exploits tiny lacunae in our current understanding of global warming, or the Discovery Institute's protestations that since biology can't replicate the genesis of living matter in a test tube, God must have made humans ex nihilo in 6000 BC.
The New York Times is literally taking at face value (and not ethnographically) claims that gay people can (and by implication, ought) attempt to alter their sexual orientation if they have some moral objection to it. Rather than investigate the absolutely insane origins of those objections--or, more importantly, the profound psychic damage they can produce in tormented young homos who have the misfortune of being raised as Mormons, Shiites, Hasids or Catholics--this article employs the time-honored tactic of not engaging the bullshit straight on but leaving it to the news consumer to read between the lines. I.e., they're lazy. And naive to think that news coverage of this ilk will placate their vituperative right-wing critics, who want to silence dissent and will regard the Times as the enemy forever, no matter how slanted and inaccurate their reporting becomes.
Are we really supposed to believe Ted Haggard is "completely heterosexual"? In all likelihood, he's completely homosexual. It would blow up the entire evangelical edifice to concede that a man with a direct line to God is an incorrigble faggot. So they'll make him disappear and call it a stunning rout for reparative therapy over the forces of licentiousness.
Similarly, what's especially pernicious is the reporting on the odd ways in which this Corey person is groping towards the truth about himself. He's afraid that his inadequate feelings as a man might be behind his gayness, and he's probably right. Boys who are sensitive or bad at sports or who like writing poetry or making clothes or decorating are generally shunted out of a rigid gender binary where 'true' manliness is as limiting as it is stringently enforced. And not everyone's good at repressing things. Childrearing in devoutly religious families tolerates nonconformity less than a lot of other situations. But the Times, dominated as it is by neoliberals and their fascination with neuroscience and genes as the causations of all things, might not entertain explanations that verge on the psychoanalytic (let alone Marxian). So yet again, in their pursuit of avoiding all things left-wing in favor of the holy and eminently "sensible" middle, they forego reality.
Why not engage in some actual investigation that proves, once and for all, that these reparative therapy scams are just that? How about some goddamn fucking journalism? Instead, this article comes off as a paean to the diversity of American religions: wow, what a rich tapestry of faiths we have...which all have some kind of evil, antigay program operating in the basement. But for every ostensible success story, there are many other stories of people who have concluded they were deluding themselves, including some who used to be among the movement’s most visible leaders. How about, "This expensive cruelty actually never works"? I don't expect an editorial anytime soon that says, "Religion is stupid. They're after your money. Any purported benefits can be derived elsewhere, and 'faith' is just a cover for stupidity or insanity. Unclench your moral sphincter and try to enjoy the time you've got with the people who love you. Love, the liberal media." But why do they always have to ferret out a highly dubious middle ground, fraught with their own political investments, and palm it off as a seasoned objectivity?
First of all, let's talk photo. It's a shot of a young, not unattractive 20-something walking to his therapist's--at night, across a parking lot, after the rain. He's wearing a leather jacket. If not for the bright lights, which suggest a film or music video set (or sexual surveillance), one might think this young closet case is out cruising.
That's just funny. More to the point, this article is yet another example of the so-called liberal media bending over backwards to cater to their staunchest critics--people whom reporters are no doubt tired of hearing bitch and complain--by "triangulating" between the accepted scientific consensus and an ideologically driven, archconservative fiction. This is perfectly analogous to taking seriously a Chevron-funded think tank that exploits tiny lacunae in our current understanding of global warming, or the Discovery Institute's protestations that since biology can't replicate the genesis of living matter in a test tube, God must have made humans ex nihilo in 6000 BC.
The New York Times is literally taking at face value (and not ethnographically) claims that gay people can (and by implication, ought) attempt to alter their sexual orientation if they have some moral objection to it. Rather than investigate the absolutely insane origins of those objections--or, more importantly, the profound psychic damage they can produce in tormented young homos who have the misfortune of being raised as Mormons, Shiites, Hasids or Catholics--this article employs the time-honored tactic of not engaging the bullshit straight on but leaving it to the news consumer to read between the lines. I.e., they're lazy. And naive to think that news coverage of this ilk will placate their vituperative right-wing critics, who want to silence dissent and will regard the Times as the enemy forever, no matter how slanted and inaccurate their reporting becomes.
Are we really supposed to believe Ted Haggard is "completely heterosexual"? In all likelihood, he's completely homosexual. It would blow up the entire evangelical edifice to concede that a man with a direct line to God is an incorrigble faggot. So they'll make him disappear and call it a stunning rout for reparative therapy over the forces of licentiousness.
Similarly, what's especially pernicious is the reporting on the odd ways in which this Corey person is groping towards the truth about himself. He's afraid that his inadequate feelings as a man might be behind his gayness, and he's probably right. Boys who are sensitive or bad at sports or who like writing poetry or making clothes or decorating are generally shunted out of a rigid gender binary where 'true' manliness is as limiting as it is stringently enforced. And not everyone's good at repressing things. Childrearing in devoutly religious families tolerates nonconformity less than a lot of other situations. But the Times, dominated as it is by neoliberals and their fascination with neuroscience and genes as the causations of all things, might not entertain explanations that verge on the psychoanalytic (let alone Marxian). So yet again, in their pursuit of avoiding all things left-wing in favor of the holy and eminently "sensible" middle, they forego reality.
Why not engage in some actual investigation that proves, once and for all, that these reparative therapy scams are just that? How about some goddamn fucking journalism? Instead, this article comes off as a paean to the diversity of American religions: wow, what a rich tapestry of faiths we have...which all have some kind of evil, antigay program operating in the basement. But for every ostensible success story, there are many other stories of people who have concluded they were deluding themselves, including some who used to be among the movement’s most visible leaders. How about, "This expensive cruelty actually never works"? I don't expect an editorial anytime soon that says, "Religion is stupid. They're after your money. Any purported benefits can be derived elsewhere, and 'faith' is just a cover for stupidity or insanity. Unclench your moral sphincter and try to enjoy the time you've got with the people who love you. Love, the liberal media." But why do they always have to ferret out a highly dubious middle ground, fraught with their own political investments, and palm it off as a seasoned objectivity?
