ju st out ▼ do co m b o r 10, 1004 ▼ 13
local news
*
Change w ith the
ichael Kelly says it was simply the
right thing to do. Kelly, the editor
of the Tigard Times, a weekly
mainstream newspaper (circula
tion: 5,500) serving the Portland
suburb of Tigard, says when a local mother ap
proached the Times to ask it to print her gay son’s
wedding announcement, Times staff barely blinked.
While a few area newspapers readily print gay and lesbian
The same cannot be said, however, for the state’s
wedding and birth notices, The Oregonian lags behind
supposed newspaper of record. The Oregonian,
which continues to adhere to its policy of banning
same-sex announcements.
by Inga Sorensen
“It is our very strong feeling that our paper
Penny and Jerry Liebertz,
should be inclusive and representative of the com
Jim' s proud parents,
munity at large, and gays and lesbians are a part of
flank
the happy couple
our community,” says Kelly, who has been editor
of the Tigard Times for the past five years. Times
Publications, which is partly owned by Denny
Smith, a conservative Republican who recently
made an unsuccessful bid to become governor,
publishes several community weeklies including
the Tigard Times.
“To the best of my knowledge this was the first
Oregonian's justification
time we had been approached to print a gay wed
for its exclusionary policy
ding announcement,” says Kelly. “We simply felt
a “smoke screen.”
that if we are going to print heterosexuals’ an
“Since when do news
nouncements, then we should also print gay
papers only cover govern
people’s announcements. It wouldn’t be right to
ment-sanctioned activi
exclude gay citizens.”
ties or relationships?
The announcement, which ran in the Times'
That’s just an excuse for
Nov. 10 issue, featured news of the Oct. 1 wedding
a newspaper’s homo
of Seattle residents Jim Liebertz, a vice president
phobia,” he says. The
and marketing manager with Washington Mu
Journal began running
tual Bank, and Dr. Felix Marcial, a dentist.
gay and lesbian wedding
More than 350 family and friends traveled
announcements two years
from across the nation and Puerto Rico to \
ago, after a gay couple
share in the couple’s celebration. Like many
came to the paper asking
( e l e h r t i l l 011
newlyweds, the duo sought to share the joy
it to do so.
ous news of their union with the community at
“There was absolutely
large by having their wedding announcement
no question we would do
printed in the newspaper. In this case, Liebertz
it,” says Pyle. "In our edi
and Marcial submitted an announcement to the
torials we had always argued for equal treatment of
Seattle Times, which printed it for a fee.
gay people. How could we then deny them equality
Liebertz, who grew up in Portland and whose
on our own wedding pages?”
parents currently live in Tigard, also hoped The
The same can be asked of The Oregonian,
Oregonian would print the announcement.
which on its own editorial pages has advocated on
Liebertz thought to himself, " The Oregonian
behalf of equal treatment for gay men and lesbians.
published the wedding announcements of five
During the Ballot Measure 13 campaign, the
of my siblings, why should my request be treated
newspaper urged voters to reject the anti-gay and
any differently?”
-lesbian rights initiative because it would require
“This was the happiest moment of my life and
that “gays be treated differently and less favorably,
I wanted to share that with everybody,” says the
not equally.” And two years ago. The Oregonian
33-year-old Liebertz. “I grew up in Portland. I
ran an unprecedented series of editorials urging a
Liebertz
went to college there. I know tons of people in
“no” vote on Ballot Measure 9.
Felix Marc«» — " ...
Oregon. I mean, this was my hometown newspa
Editorial page editor Robert Landauer won
per.” Liebertz, who was in Seattle at the time,
numerous awards for those editorials (in fact, he
asked his mother to call The Oregonian to request
has the series framed and displayed in his office),
»S3
that the couple’s announcement be published.
which maintained the estimated 280,000 lesbians
“There wasn’t any nastiness in their tone. They
and gay men in Oregon were not the “limp-wristed,
just simply said that they wouldn’t do that,” says
swish, extravagantly effeminate gay men” nor the
£
.... . * Noiilw« ■> » ' „ „ » . n » * * il«' I '1 i '" '1
„1 nw iV r'l»*
70-year-old Penny Liebertz, who, along with her
“sneering,
domineering, deep-voiced, necktie-
n. A t
* * * Mr’”
husband Jerry, was on hand for her youngest son’s
wearing, hairy-lipped lesbians” the Oregon Citi
...... « « I
Sc*«-
„„.I I n i m - * > "
wedding. “I am really proud of the Tigard Times
zens
Alliance said they were. No, Landauer ar
’i5r.5Ts.-r
for what they did. They treated my son fairly.”
gued, most lesbians and gay men are “so much like
Says Kelly: “This is simply a reflection of what
you: civil, modest, fair and constructive in the
is going on in society. A newspaper has a respon
workplace, at public events and on the playing
fields; nurturing as parents. Like you, they are
sibility to be objective and recognize this rather
community builders, not wreckers.”
than holding on to an unreal notion of what society
T l * - w
»
-------------
Yet even if gay men and lesbians are “so much
is like.”
nal,
the
Austin-Ameri-
like you [i.e., heterosexual]” and are the “commu
Donna Red Wing is the national chapter coor
can Statesman, the Brattleboro (Vt.) Reformer, the
nity builders” The Oregonian claims they are, the
dinator for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against
Everett (Wash.) Daily Herald, the Greenfield
newspaper certainly is not treating them equally.
Defamation, a national organization that monitors
(Mass.)
Recorder,
the
Keene
(N.H.)
Sentinel,
the
“We print wedding announcements as a com
anti-gay and -lesbian bias in mainstream media.
Minneapolis Tribune, the Northampton (Mass.)
munity service,” says Hobart. “We do this for
Red Wing, the former executive director of the
Hampshire
Gazette,
the
Marin
(Calif.)
Indepen
members
of the community who want to share
Portland-based Lesbian Community Project, says,
dent Journal, the San Jose Mercury News, and the
important information about their lives.” When
“Five years ago it would have been considered
Seattle
Times.
Some
papers,
such
as
the
Seattle
asked
if this community service is only available to
revolutionary for a mainstream newspaper to print
Times, run heterosexuals’ announcements for free,
heterosexual members of the community, Hobart
a same-sex wedding announcement. That’s simply
but
make
gay
and
lesbian
couples
pay
for
that
replied, “That’s right.”
not the case anymore. If The Oregonian is worried
opportunity.
The Liebertz-Marcial rejection is not an iso
about being on the cutting edge it doesn’t have to,
Sue
Hobart,
senior
features
editor
for
The
lated
case. (Hobart first told us The Oregonian
because many papers across the country are al
Oregonian, says her paper does not print same-sex
receives requests to print same-sex announcements
ready doing this.”
wedding
announcements
because
those
relation
“regularly,”
but quickly switched it to “periodi
Among the newspapers that have abolished the
ships are not legal. In an earlier interview, George
cally.”) In 1992, Portland resident Dr. Mary Ann
practice of discriminating against gay men and
Pyle,
editor
of
the
Salina
Journal,
a
daily
newspa
Humphrey, author, educator and former cable tele
lesbians who are seeking the same treatment as
per (circulation: 30,000) in Kansas, called The
vision host, and her partner of nearly a decade,
opposite-sex couples are: the Salina (Kan.) Jour-
M
Times
,§ii§s^ 25 ==:
1 Itg U S ls ^
*
filled out The Oregonian's required wedding an
nouncement form and sent it in with a photo of their
commitment ceremony, which had been officiated
by a minister.
"We waited and waited but nothing was
printed,” says Humphrey. “Finally I called and
was told that I shouldn’t expect anything to appear
because The Oregonian won’t print gay commit
ment announcements. I was very upset, but I’m
getting older now and have to pick and choose my
battles.”
In another case, Jocelyn Somers, a Portland
attorney, and her partner of more than seven years,
Kathleen McNaughton, a real estate agent, hoped
to publicly celebrate the birth last year of their son.
Like other proud mothers, Somers filled out the
paperwork that is circulated among parents after
the births of their babies. The form asks who the
parents are, as well as information about the new
born. That information is then passed on to various
newspapers for public announcement purposes,
“I filled out the form and it included both my
name and Kathleen’s name. When it appeared in
The Oregonian. Kathleen’s name had been re
moved. I was livid,” says Somers. "I called up and
asked what happened. I was told by [Oregonian
staffer) Jerry Boone that they didn’t print informa
tion about same-sex couples. I asked him whether
they would have printed the information in full if
it included a man’s name. He said yes. I then asked
whether they would have bothered to check to see
if that information were factual. He told me no, and
said The Oregonian automatically printed infor
mation if it included a man’s name. I said to him,
’So I could have written down that the father was
Jerry Boone of Donald Duck and you would have
printed it?’ He said, ‘Yes.’ ”
Somers, who was still weak from a caesarean
section, chose not to pursue the issue, although she
remained outraged. “This was supposed to be a
happy time for us, and this was making it miser
able. I decided not to pursue it, but I am really sorry
that I don’t have |an Oregonian] clipping of my
son’s birth announcement for his scrapbook. We
are proud of our relationship and we wanted to
share the news about our son’s birth with the whole
community, yet The Oregonian forced us into
silence.”
Somers says the announcement did run intact in
the Beaverton Valley Times (circulation: 7,2(H)),
another weekly newspaper published by Times
Publications.
Liebertz, a Portland State University graduate
who worked at First Interstate Bank of Oregon for
nine years before moving to Seattle in 1988, adds:
“Saying I was disappointed is an understatement.
This was the most important day of my life.... My
mother has clippings of all my other siblings’
wedding announcements, and now there’s this
gaping hole where mine should have been.”
For her part, Oregonian editor Sandra Rowe
says, “As society changes, so do newspapers.
Maybe we should take a look at this whole issue,
but I’m not going to predict when or if there will be
any changes.”
The Times' Kelly says his paper has received
about a dozen calls from readers protesting the
inclusion of a gay couple in its wedding section; a
half dozen readers canceled their subscriptions.
One woman even left an anonymous message on
Penny and Jerry Liebertz’s answering machine
saying she was discontinuing her subscription to
the Tigard Times because of the “vulgar” wedding
announcement it printed. Penny responded by writ
ing a letter to the Times thanking the newspaper
staff for their open-mindedness.
“A newspaper prints many requests without
inquiring as to the type of wedding or commitment
ceremony, religious or other,” she wrote. “News
papers do not only print items that meet with one
person’s approval, or there would be little to print.”
In addition, two readers called to thank the Times.
Kelly says, “We’re not being heroic, we’re just
doing our job." When asked whether the paper will
continue to print same-sex announcements, he
answers, “Yes, of course.”
ei