Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
Westboro Baptist Church keeps popping up in GetReligion territory thanks to its ability to capture attention through protests and lawsuits. Of course, the news yesterday that the Supreme Court ruled in the group’s favor is impossible to ignore.
The first time I ever heard about Jane Russell’s Bible studies was here at GetReligion and I could hardly believe it. I imagined the star of Outlaw and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes pouring out of her blouse rather than poring over Scripture. Russell died on Monday and it was interesting to see how obituary writers handled it.
So it has happened again. It may be time for more showers of rose petals among some — repeat SOME — Muslims in the troubled land of Pakistan.
As I was reading abortion news in Mother Jones and LifeNews.com recently, it occurred to me that most of the news — and I’m not even counting opinion — that I consume regarding sanctity of life issues comes from outside the mainstream media. It’s obviously a bigger problem on the pro-life side of things. I was shocked to learn last week, for instance, that NBC has still not reported on the Planned Parenthood sting videos. The media more or less ignored the amazing updates coming out of the Philadelphia abortion doctor murder case.
In other Associated Press news, The Washington Post Website published a short AP story out of England yesterday that raised more questions than it answered. The article was only five paragraphs, so I can’t adequately discuss it without posting it in its entirety. Here’s what washingtonpost.com ran under the headline “Couple lose foster care right over anti-gay stance“:
One does not have to read GetReligion for long to realize that the scribes at this particular weblog are not very fond of news reports that use:
Some newspapers become obsessed with localizing just for the sake of localizing. Editors will look at something that happened in India and then get their reporters to find local Indian-Americans to comment on the issue. I know first-hand because I have been asked to do these stories in the past.
The Tennessean had a front-page story last week with lots of religion in it. You can get a good feel for the tone of the piece from the headline “Tennessee bill would jail Shariah followers: Proposed law is ‘nonsense,’ critic says.”
