Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
Probably the best example of how the mainstream media completely games the coverage of same-sex marriage is an article from the Los Angeles Times. “Election leaves gay couple feeling isolated in conservative bastion” is about these two heroic lesbians who opposed Proposition 8 while living in a conservative neighborhood in Riverside County.
When I started thinking about a career on the religion-beat, the first professional that I met was another Baylor University graduate who was on the rise at the Houston Chronicle.
The Chicago Tribune‘s version of the pew gap story that permeated news outlets last week focuses heavily on the slight percentage shifts in party preference among Catholics, white evangelicals, and “worshipers who attend church frequently.” The article’s focus on these three statistical categories emphasizes that a factor in President-elect Barack Obama’s victory was his slight improvement in the pews over the failed 2004 Democratic Nominee John Kerry. This runs contrary to the notion that Obama failed to close the pew gap.
So the protests against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints because of its support for Proposition 8 are continuing and receiving quite a bit of mainstream media coverage. Proposition 8 passed a constitutional amendment defining marriage as an institution involving one man and one woman. Stories involve everything from Mormon churches being vandalized to large-scale protests in urban areas.
Billy Graham turned 90 at the end of this past week, a landmark event that received very little press, all things considered. There were other things going on in the nation, of course.
It’s a good thing I have been following the Proposition 8 battle because if I hadn’t, there is no way I would have understood this Los Angeles Times story at all. It’s about a protest organized by opponents of the Proposition 8, the initiative that passed Tuesday amending the California Constitution to define marriage as an institution involving one man and one woman. While a non-constitutional ballot initiative saying the same thing passed with an even greater margin 8 years ago, the state supreme court had ruled that bans on same-sex marriage were unconstitutional. Anyway, this initiative — already in the works before the June ruling — passed and there have been various protests around the state.
It is no surprise that Newsweek has joined the chorus declaring evangelicals as big losers in this year’s election. What surprises me more is the exaggerated tone of both the headline on Newsweek‘s Web Exclusive by Lisa Miller — “Post-Evangelical America” — and of her first three sentences:
Democrats were more successful in attracting religious voters across the board this year than in the previous election — that much seems indisputable.
