Not one anti-gay spokesperson was polled on his or her 'take' on the situation. That's odd considering how strident opponents are and how readily they will spout their hate and lies.
No. In fact the coverage was rather self-congratulatory. Golly gee, aren't we enlightened and aren't we pleased to have moved on?
Look at this CBC piece for example.
And we have come a long way pretty damn quickly.
In 2002, an Ekos poll found that 47 per cent of Canadians had an unfavourable opinion of same-sex marriage. Taking into account the high number of undecideds, the pollsters concluded that opponents of gay marriage made up a majority. In 2012, an Ipsos Reid poll found that just 18 per cent of respondents were “totally opposed” to same-sex marriage. What happened?Well, some would say that 'media happened'.
Even in the US, things are moving along on this front. Here's a bit of video on media there congratulating itself for its role in normalizing USians' view of gays and gay culture.
In fact, one pundit says: 'Gay culture is American culture'.
Funny thing. Here, pro-choice culture is Canadian culture.
But does our media celebrate that achievement? Does it congratulate itself for moving the issue forward and normalizing the notion that women have the same right to bodily autonomy that men do?
Does it appropriately marginalize the tiny percentage of extremists -- around 5% -- 'totally opposed' to abortion rights?
No. Canadian media -- perhaps envious of the acrimonious and profitable abortion 'debate' in the US -- continue to try to whip up controversy where it just doesn't exist. In covering Dr Morgentaler's death 22 of 35 stories saw fit to consult wannabe abortion abolishers to 'balance' the views of Dr Morgentaler's friends and supporters.
One would think this is counter-productive. After all, a large majority of Canadians -- two-thirds of us -- don't even want to talk about it.
But a group that does want to talk about it is the nutters themselves of course. In fact, the media's obeisance to their foot-stomping and shrieking has them crowing 'The media is ours'.
If this was war, one could say that the Canadian media is giving comfort to the enemy.
We ask again: When will Canadian media step up and celebrate the achievement of human rights for women?
1 comment:
When will Canadian media step up and celebrate the achievement of human rights for women?
That's a very good question. Whenever opponents to same sex marriage get any ink, they are cast as a hard right religious minority. There is none of this extreme views on both sides of the debate nonsense that's so prevalent when it comes to any coverage of abortion. The fact that the extreme fetus fetishists were given any ink by the media when covering Dr. Henry Morgentaler's death is just painful.
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