Mediaite reported that GLAAD succeeded in pressuring CNN into spiking an online poll that asked the question “Is the surge in gay TV characters 'bad for society'?” On the GLAAD blog, Aaron McQuade found it was "troubling" for CNN to allow dissent:
The report then goes on to give a troubling amount of airtime to anti-gay activist Dan Gainor from the Culture and Media Institute, who does believe that it’s “bad for society” to offer authentic depictions of the lives of LGBT people. He remarked that, “Hollywood has done a great deal of work causing acceptance in American culture for homosexuality.”
Why would you object to this sentence? This happens to be as factual as asserting that the sky is blue. It also acknowledges GLAAD's power to pressure Hollywood. The only answer is that Gainor seems to disapprove, and disapproval is not allowed. It's a false "dualism" to allow debate:
But CNN’s offensive poll and its attempts to manufacture controversy by granting a platform to so-called experts like Gainor follows an alarming trend of media outlets creating simplistic, predictable “pro-gay”/”anti-gay” dualisms that do a great disservice to viewers who are seeking information on the diversity of opinion and experience within our community.
We will continue to challenge this type of coverage.
That is, the "type of coverage" that allows anyone to disagree.
