Jeremy Ames (left) and Taka Ariga kiss outside of Washington D.C.'s superior court March 3, the day marriage licenses became available to same-sex couples. (courtesy of Bill O'leary/the Washington Post)
Last week the Washington Post published a picture of two men kissing on its front page. The picture accompanied the story D.C. begins licensing same-sex marriages. Once the picture hit newsstands, readers started sounding off, and most weren’t happy. In the “Ombudsman Blog” on the Post’s Web site, reader representative, Andrew Alexander, cited several reactions the story received:
“A few of the readers have engaged in rants, often with anti-gay slurs. One called me to complain about ‘promoting a faggot lifestyle.’ Another complained about the photo in an e-mail to the two Post reporters who wrote Thursday’s story about the licenses: ‘That kind of stuff makes normal people want to throw up. People have kids who are being exposed to this crap. I will be glad when your rag goes out of business. Real men marry women.’
“Wrote Lee Miller of Columbia: ‘I would appreciate it if your cover pictures would not be so disturbing where my kids can see it easily on the kitchen table… please don’t shove this ‘Gay’ business in our face. This is something that should have shown up on an inside page or two (without the picture).’”
And that’s just a few of them. 27 people canceled their subscriptions because of the picture.
Keep in mind, I’m completely biased in this situation. I’m not surprised that some people reacted badly to this picture, but I am surprised by the number of people who responded negatively and by the disturbing nature of their comments. Newspapers run pictures of dead bodies, natural disasters, and war. If I wasn’t so disturbed by the comments the picture received, I would laugh. Who’d have thought two guys kissing would set off a spark? The Post is known as a left-leaning paper. This is a newsworthy issue, not just for D.C. but for the nation. That picture tells the story. Alexander said it best: “There was a time, after court-ordered integration, when readers complained about front-page photos of blacks mixing with whites. Today, photo images of same-sex couples capture the same reality of societal change.”
Last Thursday The New York Times posted a similar photo of two different men kissing in D.C. One was holding their new marriage license. The NYT’s put the picture on an inside page. I cut out the picture and taped it to my door. I remember thinking, “Things are finally starting to change.”
No amount of negative responses can take that away from this movement.
