2006 Karen Grigsby Bates photo by Sandy Huffaker via NPR

Dan Savage at The Stranger called reporter Karen Grigsby Bates out on the carpet for a recent report she filed for National Public Radio about the consequences suffered by supporters of California Proposition 8, which outlawed gay marriages. Bates gives several examples in her story of victims of the Prop 8 backlash:

In Los Angeles, would-be patrons of a popular Tex-Mex restaurant were greeted by furious protestors like John Dennison. “El Coyote — millions in gay margarita money funding hatred,” Dennison yelled during the protest. “Boycott El Coyote!” The restaurant owner’s daughter, Margie Christofferson, a faithful Mormon, had made a modest $100 contribution to the “Yes on 8″ campaign — and the restaurant’s gay patrons, like Edward Stanley, felt betrayed.

[...]

In Sacramento, the owners of Leatherby’s Family Creamery found themselves part of the backlash when The Sacramento Bee printed the list of contributors. Dave Leatherby, a devout Roman Catholic father of 10, says he was responding to a direct request from his bishop to give generously. “We gave $20,000 for Yes on Proposition 8,” he says. And once that was known, retaliation was swift. “We soon started getting very nasty e-mails and letters and phone calls by the hundreds,” he says.  Leatherby says he was mystified, because the Creamery had always enjoyed good relations with the gay and lesbian community.

[...]

Richard Raddon, director of the Los Angeles Film Festival, and Scott Eckern, director of the California Musical Theater in Sacramento, are devout Mormons. Both made contributions to Yes on 8, and both got demands for their resignations from gay rights protestors. They quit so their organizations wouldn’t face further controversy. Ironically, the film festival has been instrumental in introducing works by gay and lesbian filmmakers to a broader audience — and the musical theater included works by gay playwrights and composers.

You can not be for gay rights but against gay marriage.  It’s boggling that Dave Leatherby is so “mystified” by the angry response to his $20,000 support of Proposition 8.  Are these people that clueless?   It’s great that they don’t actively hate on gays, but when they deny them the legal rights that state-sponsored marriage affords couples, they are bashing them in the denial of civil rights.  Marriage is a civil institution, not just a religious institution.

What sticks out to me is that these are the same old examples of Proposition 8 backlash.  El Coyote, Richard Raddon and Scott Eckern are such old news that after reading this piece I wonder if this supposed backlash has gone anywhere.  The other thing that stuck out was that Bates interviewed not one gay activist for this piece about a gay activist backlash.

This omission was what Dan Savage pointed out last week, especially glaring since Bates quotes the Yes on 8 campaign for the piece:

And who does Bates go to for a quote about what all this means? Frank Schubert, spokesman for the Yes on 8 campaign. No gay activists are quoted about the impact of Prop 8, or the reasoning behind the boycotts. Bates speaks to no gay leaders, she doesn’t quote anyone about the role that boycotts have played in other civil rights struggles, from the African American Civil Rights Movement (think of that poor bus company!) to struggles farm workers’ rights (did anyone ever think of the poor people who owned the vineyards where grapes were grown?). All we hear from our faithful Mormons and devout Roman Catholics who “exercised their constitutional right to freedom of religion” and now find themselves “endangered” by “angry gay rights activists.”

Gee, maybe a gay person should’ve been asked to respond to those charges. Perhaps a gay person could’ve pointed out that we are under no obligation to patronize businesses that are owned and operated by our enemies, discussed other boycotts launched during other civil rights struggles, and pointed out that gays and lesbians have just as much right as faithful Mormons or devout Roman Catholics to act on our consciences and spend our money accordingly, and, again, that boycotts are a peaceful and legitimate form of protest, not “witch hunts.”

Direct complaints about KGB’s idiotic and unfair “reporting” to NPR’s ombudsman here, or call 202-513-3245.

The Minnesota Independent picked up on Savage’s post (“Hah hah. NPR is actually being balanced? Sounds good to me,” wrote one commenter) and Queerty’s Japhy Grant picked up its torch and also called on people to complain in a piece entitled “NPR Hearts Prop. 8 Supporters“:

Bates goes further, saying that all the protests have given “rise to charges that as gay rights advocates tried to change public opinion, some stepped over the line and turned their protest into a witch hunt”, which is a journalisticly weasel way to insert her own opinion into the article. Watch how easy it is: “Some are now claiming that Karen Grigsby Bates is using public radio to bash gays and lesbians by accusing them of ‘witch hunts’ without bothering to get any quotes from actual gay people.”

He ends the post with, “Yes, that’s right: We’re calling for a witch hunt on Karen Grigsby Bates.”

Ouch!

As of this writing, the story over at NPR has 305 comments, which is pretty huge for an NPR on-line forum.  I wouldn’t dream of wading into it, as the conversation over there has completely devolved into nonsense.  Here’s one exchange so that you may spare yourself the full carnival: