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KEVIN NAFF
Friday, April 04, 2008
THE STORY OF a gay Army major who ded in Iraq has presented the Washington Post and other mainstream media outlets with an opportunity to revisit and update their stylebook policies regarding when to identify someone as gay.
As the Blade reported last week, Maj. Alan Rogers, by all accounts a hero for his brave acts while serving in Iraq, was killed in January and buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Rogers lived as openly gay a life as he could, given the military’s discriminatory “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. He had many gay friends in D.C., patronized gay businesses and even worked as treasurer for the D.C. chapter of American Veterans for Equal Rights, a group working to overturn the military’s gay ban.
But the mainstream media accounts of his death omitted any reference to his sexual orientation. These were not benign omissions. The Washington Post, in particular, worked overtime to excise any mention of Rogers’ sexual orientation. It did not even report his work for AVER. Several of Rogers’ gay friends told the Blade that they were interviewed by a Post reporter at the funeral, but their memories were not included in the paper’s coverage.
Even in death, the military succeeded in keeping Rogers in the closet — until his grieving friends began speaking out. It’s one thing for the military to hide the truth of this hero’s life, but it’s quite another for the media to play along.
The Post ditched its responsibility to the truth, opting instead to enforce its 1950s-era views of sexual orientation that require gay subjects to remain in the closet.
The paper’s ombudsman, Deborah Howell, agreed that the paper had erred.
“The Post was right to be cautious, but there was enough evidence — particularly of Rogers’ feelings about ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ — to warrant quoting his friends and adding that dimension to the story of his life,” Howell wrote in a column Sunday. “The story would have been richer for it.”
The story would have been accurate for it.
MOST DISTURBING ABOUT the Post’s coverage is that it wasn’t a Metro section reporter or even a junior editor who made the call to straight-wash Rogers’ life. That decision was made by Executive Editor Len Downie himself, according to Howell.
The reporter’s original story included accounts of Rogers’ sexual orientation and the issue triggered a debate among editors who deemed it an “agonizing decision.” But “the decision ultimately was made by Executive Editor Len Downie, who said that there was no proof that Rogers was gay and no clear indication that, if he was, he wanted the information made public.”
And there we have it, at last, an explanation for the antiquated way the Post so often deals with the issue of sexual orientation in its coverage: the top editor doesn’t get it.
It’s incredible that reporting such a basic fact about someone led to an agonizing debate among editors, necessitating Downie’s involvement. How frequently does Downie get in the weeds of stories appearing inside the Metro section? Doesn’t the top editor of the Washington Post have more pressing issues to worry about?
Downie seeks “proof,” yet he removed any mention of Rogers’ gay friends from the story. He worries that Rogers may not have wanted this information made public, but Rogers worked for a gay rights group. Clearly, Rogers was not afraid of people knowing the truth about his life. There was concern that Rogers’ few surviving family members — cousins — didn’t want the Post to report on his being gay. But what gay people know is that many of our family members would prefer we stayed in the closet. That decision should not be left to disapproving relatives. For so many gay and lesbian people, friends become a chosen family. And in Rogers’ case, they should have been trusted to speak on his behalf.
Downie’s decision, and the Post’s stylebook policy, help perpetuate the notion that being gay is something to hide. If Rogers had been straight, there would be no heated debate about making references to relationships or hobbies that implied he was heterosexual. At the very least, Downie could have left intact a reference to AVER, a basic and hardly controversial fact.
THE POST’S STYLEBOOK states, “A person’s sexual orientation should not be mentioned unless relevant to the story … Not everyone espousing gay rights causes is homosexual. When identifying an individual as gay or homosexual, be cautious about invading the privacy of someone who may not wish his or her sexual orientation known.”
The policy is outdated and overly broad. Of course you don’t mention sexual orientation when not relevant, but in an obituary? As the cliché goes, on your deathbed, no one wishes they’d spent more time on the job; they wish for more time with loved ones. Reporting the identities of those loved ones and their relationship to the deceased ought to be mandatory.
But the Post’s problems go beyond the obit section. Another recent example of the wrong-headedness of the stylebook policy comes to mind. When Metro held auditions to find the new voice for its “doors closing” announcement, the Post interviewed and profiled the winner — a lesbian. Is it relevant to the story about Metro that its new public voice is gay? Not in a straightforward news account. But in a feature story about that person’s life, it’s essential. The Post ignored her sexual orientation and left readers with more questions about this woman than answers.
The same goes for the Rogers story. His friend Lara Ballard put it best: “Anyone who didn’t know Alan was gay didn’t know Alan very well.”
The Post’s gay problem manifests itself with unfortunate regularity — from the straight-washed obituaries of gay figures like Susan Sontag and Ismail Merchant to a recent travel article erroneously stating that anti-gay discrimination in public accommodations is illegal in Virginia.
The Rogers case represents a chance for the Post and other mainstream media outlets to thoughtfully reexamine how they view sexual orientation. It is not a private fact for straight people and it should not be considered a private fact for gay people. It’s time to abolish that offensive and destructive double standard.
Maybe when the media grow up and deal in a mature, responsible and factual way with sexual orientation, the military will follow and finally end “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
That’s what Rogers worked for and it would be a fitting tribute to his life.
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