Got Jesus?

Yesterday, the people who organize the Gay Pride parade in the Twin Cities filed a complaint against the Star Tribune. This one could sting: They are complaining to the Minnesota Commission on Civil Rights because the Strib apparently refused to publish an advertisement for the parade that showed two men kissing.

Many interested readers who pay attention to the subtleties have been piqued by the Strib in recent years—in fact, ever since Keith Moyers took over the paper. There have been some real brow-raising moments, particularly on the publishing side of the paper. Last summer, for example, there was a widespread rumor that high-ranking ad executives were avid followers of Luis Palau. Thus had his ballyhooed “Twin Cities Festival” not only got sweetheart status in the sales department, but the edit department had also bowed to the will of the Lord and published numerous odd features that could only be called fawning.

Then this fall, the paper refused to publish an advertisement that had no images at all— in fact, it was a piece of poster art depicting a bunch of numbers. It was a mathematical compendium of the lives and limbs lost so far in Iraq. (An advertisement we subsequently published in The Rake, incidentally. Of all the consipiracy theories, we like the one that suggests the Strib has something against simple math. It certainly seems to be catching in the newspaper industry.)

So what the hell is going on with the Newspaper of the Twin Cities? We doubt whether there’s truly an emergent Christian fundamentalist impulse taking over down on Portland Avenue. Like most of these things, the real story is found neither on the front page nor the ad pages nor even in the op-ed pages, but in the McClatchy spread sheets.

It is just barely possible that the Strib is hoping to outflank the Pioneer Press’s alleged play to the right (going for all those wacky Woodbury readers with backyard bomb-shelters, you know). What is more likely is that the business is simply responding to a certain neap tide of community sentiment. While the city’s liberal core has been just as loud and outraged as ever, the Christian right has—as they say—been emboldened by what we in the Big Bad Media have made of them in the past 90 days.

We don’t hear about it so much here on the far-left side of downtown—but then we’ve always tried to respect community standards in a kind of surgical way. (A smarter culture war!) But over there on the right side of Minneapolis, we imagine the Strib has seen a real spike in envelopes bearing a return address from the Holy Name Society. The Strib is undoubtedly the bellwether for this type of critical mass. On the opposite end of the publishing spectrum, we understand there are similar pressures. We hear through the grapevine that the Minneapolis office of the Onion is no longer accepting display ads for sexual services—in other words, pictures of boys kissing boys—and it sure as hell ain’t because they suddenly got Jesus.

One word, people: Circulation.—The Editor in Cheese


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