▼ O ctober 21. 1094 ▼ just out
Donahue’s unbalanced act
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Recently, Esther Newton—the lesbian author
of Mother Camp, a book about drag— was asked
to be a guest on an episode of Phil Donahue’s
show. Other guests included a well-known drag
queen and the stars of the movie The Adventures
o f Priscilla, Queen ofthe Desert. Hours before the
taping, New ton was inform ed that Paul
Cameron— a defrocked psychologist and noted
homophobe— would also be on the panel of guests.
Cameron’s appearance would provide “balance,”
Donahue’s producers argued.
Before the show was taped, the producers had
been provided with ample documentation dem
onstrating that Cameron conducted fraudulent
“research” on homosexuality and had no credibil
ity as an expert on human sexuality. Nonetheless,
they insisted on keeping Cameron in the line-up.
Adrienne Wheeler—the Donahue producer who
booked Cameron— assured Newton that “Phil
would handle Cameron” and expose the pseudo
psychologist’s disreputable career in hate-mon-
gering.
According to Esther Newton, the talk show
host did not “handle” Cameron at all. Instead,
Phil’s guests were left to fend for themselves.
Once again, lesbian, gay and transgendered guests
were forced into a debate with a homophobic
lunatic—a move that too-often precludes any
focused discussion of the issues that are (purport
edly) at hand.
Would the producers of the Donahue show
require Spike Lee to sit on stage with a member of
the KKK, in order to “balance” a discussion of the
director’s film work? Could they insist that an
interview with the cast of Schindler’s List would
be “unfair” unless a neo-Nazi was invited to
participate? Jo u rn alists routinely include
homophobic bigots in the coverage of any lesbian
or gay subject. As Larry Gross of the University
of Pennsylvania points out, this insidious media
bias promotes “a dueling experts circus routine
that legitimates homophobes as morally equal to
gays.”
Certainly, Paul Cameron’s homophobic “re
search” agenda should be discussed on national
television. But that discussion should take place
in a forum dedicated to examining Cameron’s
claims. Cameron has published a slew of “re
search” pamphlets asserting— among other
things— that most murderers and child molesters
are gay, that lesbians are bad drivers, and that
lesbians and gay men are not victims of hate
violence but, instead, provoke physical assaults
for political purposes. Rather than providing a
privileged forum for homophobes to attack lesbi
ans and gay men, talk shows should require
Cameron and his ilk to defend their hateful lies.
Direct your comments to Patricia McMillan,
Executive Producer, The Phil Donahue Show,
NBC, 30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10112,
(212) 664-6501, fax: (212) 757-5386.
Here’s the story of a dyke
named Brady...
For well over a decade, the familiar Brady
Bunch refrain has chimed daily from television
sets around the globe. Now, the campy ’70s hit
series is being made into a Hollywood feature
film, and one of those “lovely girls” might also be
a lovely lesbian.
The Paramount film is currently in produc
tion, and writers Jim Berg and Stan Zimmerman
(creators of Roseanne’s infamous “lesbian kiss”
episode) have suggested that the character of
Marcia Brady will become involved with another
v^o.man. Ip the film, Marcia’s best friend is Nicole,
arrrnit tesbian/M arcia's friend develops k crush
on the eldest Brady daughter and, according to
Zimmerman, “Nicole gets what she’s after in the
end.” Variety reports that RuPaul will play a high
school guidance counselor in the movie.
People who read
People
Readers of People Weekly have been treated to
an improved, more lesbian-positive magazine.
Most recently (Sept. 5), the popular magazine’s
Couples section featured a two-page spread on
singer Melissa Etheridge and her lover Julie
Cypher. “Her Grammy is nice,” the magazine
notes, but Etheridge’s lover is her “greatest prize.”
PHOTO BY DENNIS
Wedding
Rings
Melissa Etheridge
“A House in Harmony,” written by Peter Castro
and John Griffiths, profiles Etheridge and Cypher
in both words and photos. The feature deals
nonchalantly with the couple’s blossoming rela
tionship and peeks— without sensationalism—
into the personal histories of each woman.
Stopping the silence
The Oct. 4 broadcast of the NBC news pro
gram Dateline featured a gay high-school teacher
whose career is on the line. After he showed his
class a film about the Holocaust, Mehlville High
School teacher Rodney Wilson displayed a poster
of the various patches worn by those incarcerated
in the Nazi concentration camps. The poster in
cluded the pink triangle, and Wilson told his class:
“As a gay man, I would have been forced to wear
the pink triangle.” After a period of silence, his
students literally applauded Wilson’s decision to
come out in the classroom.
According to the Dateline report, however,
school officials have been less enlightened than
Wilson’s students. Ronald Jones, the principal of
Mehlville High School, described Wilson’s state
ment as “inappropriate conduct.” School Super
intendent Bob Rodgers agreed, and suggested
that references to homosexuality have no place in
the curriculum.
The Dateline report provided Rodney Wilson
with a forum to rebut such assertions. He noted
that the 800-page history text he used contained
no mention of lesbian or gay people and he was
only trying to “stop the silence.” He said, “I
simply stated a historical fact that gays were
persecuted by the Nazis. I stated another fact, that
I am gay. And I put those two facts together.”
Wilson added: “If it causes one kid to stop believ
ing that gay people are monsters, then that’s a
good thing.”
The Dateline report also noted that, despite
four years of “glowing” evaluations, Wilson’s job
is now in jeopardy. He is up for tenure this spring.
Comments can be sent to Dateline, NBC News,
30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10021, fax:
(212) 664-3330,e-mail: dateline@news.nbc.com.
Or contact Rodney Wilson or Ronald Jones (prin
cipal) at Mehlville High School, 3200 L enay
Ferry Road, St. Louis, MO 63125, (314) 892-5000;
or Bob Rodgers (superintendent), 3120 Lemay
Ferry Road, St. Louis, MO 63125.
From the "GLAAD Media Watch, ”
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byAIKtehmsser