Our friend Jay Blotcher, a freelance writer, has been sacked as a stringer for the New York Times because he was involved with ACT UP over ten years ago.

Blotcher, who has been involved with gay and AIDS groups in the past, joined the newspaper as a stringer––a freelance reporter––in 2001 after he left New York City for the Hudson Valley. For much of his employment he contributed stories or reporting without ever getting a byline in the paper.

In late 2003, Blotcher published two stories and, under a new Times policy, his name appeared on those pieces. One story dealt with the trial of a woman who was accused of killing her three children. The second concerned some vandalism on a college campus.

“I never dealt with gay issues or AIDS issues,” Blotcher said.

Someone, an editor, another reporter, or a reader noted Blotcher’s name and recalled that he was once a member of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, or ACT UP.

“There was no complaint,” wrote Susan Edgerley, the Times metropolitan editor, in response to a Gay City News e-mail query. “We recognized the name from his work with ACT UP.”

That was it for Blotcher. On January 12, Lew Serviss, a Times editor, told him the paper would no longer use him in any section. When he appealed to Edgerley she responded, “I am setting the bar high to protect against any appearance of conflict of interest that might result through the hiring of stringers and leg-people. My motivation is expediency as well as ethics––we simply do not spend as much time checking into the backgrounds of independent contractors as we do of fulltime staff people.”

…

The real problem here is that The Times isn’t committed to its own ethics policy. Let’s look at just two Times reporters.

Lawrence K. Altman is a former employee of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and he regularly reports on that agency. Altman also sits on an advisory board that administers a CDC fellowship program. In other words, his relationship with the CDC continues. That would be an actual conflict of interest.

Bernard Weinraub covers the film industry in Los Angeles and his wife heads Columbia Pictures. A portion of their household income, probably the majority, comes from a major player in the industry Weinraub covers. That would also be an actual conflict of interest.

If The Times believed in its ethics policy then it would defend a Jay Blotcher when he follows that policy, but then the newspaper would have to do something about Weinraub and Altman. Neither man returned a phone call seeking comment.

The Times isn’t serious about ethics. The paper, to use Edgerley’s word, is concerned with “expediency.”

Updated: Atrios has more information on The Times’s idea of ethics. Also, I see that this was mentioned in the Washington Post last week in Howard Kurtz’s column.

There is no such thing as the State
And no one exists alone;
Hunger allows no choice
To the citizen or the police;
We must love one another or die.

— From September 1, 1939 by W.H. Auden

James and I went to an amazing concert by the Orchestra of St. Luke’s on Thursday night. Go read his account.

Two of my mother’s closest friends in the town where she lives, Conway, Arkansas, are a gay couple named John and Robert.

There was an article about them in the local paper recently. I’m not crazy about how it’s written, but the fact that it was given such prominence is pretty cool.

History

Schenck grew up in New York with five brothers. One brother would later hold Schenck’s new boyfriend, Loyd, while another pistol whipped him. A football player, Schenck was beaten by several members of the team after rejecting sexual advances from one of the players. In 1969, Schenck participated in the Stonewall riots in New York, he told the class.

Loyd was born in Germany and came to America when he was 3 years old. He grew up in Damascus. His family has a strong military background. Loyd denounced his German citizenship when he was 18 to join the United States Army. He fought in Vietnam.

During an earlier interview, Loyd discussed fighting for his rights. He was naive, Loyd said, and later felt like some of the rights he fought for seemed to be jerked away.

“I was born with those rights,” Loyd said to the class.

“My life is about all of us being equal and sharing equally in the burden of life, or the joys of life,” Loyd said.

The couple celebrated 29 years together Jan. 19.

My mother just e-mailed me:

My friends are having a wedding ceremony Sunday on the steps of the State Capitol. While I was there this afternoon they got permission to gather there from the Secretary of State’s office. There was a problem at first getting permission because the Boy Scouts have a gathering there at same time. They have been talking with ACLU and the Arkansas Diversity Assoc. about being there in support as the news media have been notified.

We went to a couple of openings on Wednesday night. James has the details.

For the people out there that read me using an RSS reader (I recommend bloglines), I have added a feed that gives my full posts plus any comments. I did the same for James.

RSS 1.0 full feed for bloggy

RSS 1.0 full feed for jameswagner.com

I got the template for the feed here, via Nicole/The Go Fish.

Aargh. It’s bad enough that Bush wants to “protect” marriage:

Marriage cannot be severed from its cultural, religious and natural roots without weakening the good influence of society. Government, by recognizing and protecting marriage, serves the interests of all. Today I call upon the Congress to promptly pass, and to send to the states for ratification, an amendment to our Constitution defining and protecting marriage as a union of man and woman as husband and wife. The amendment should fully protect marriage, while leaving the state legislatures free to make their own choices in defining legal arrangements other than marriage.

America is a free society, which limits the role of government in the lives of our citizens. This commitment of freedom, however, does not require the redefinition of one of our most basic social institutions. Our government should respect every person, and protect the institution of marriage. There is no contradiction between these responsibilities. We should also conduct this difficult debate in a manner worthy of our country, without bitterness or anger.

In all that lies ahead, let us match strong convictions with kindness and goodwill and decency.

But we also have to listen to the press lying about what the amendment would do:

Mr. Bush was not specific today about the wording he would like to see Congress adopt in beginning the constitutional-amendment process. He did not, for instance, mention legislation proposed by Representative Marilyn Musgrave, Republican of Colorado.

The amendment that Ms. Musgrave and other lawmakers are backing in the House says: “Neither this Constitution or the constitution of any state, nor state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.” The White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, said just before the president’s announcement that Mr. Bush believed the Musgrave measure “meets his principles.”

Most reasonable analyses of the Musgrave language state that it would ban civil unions as well, overturning even existing law. Here is a writeup from Yale Law professor Jack Balkin, and one from FAIR.

Do not trust the mainstream media to tell you the truth about this.

One last thought. The Democrats’ (including Kerry and Edwards but not Kucinich) position on this, one of “we don’t support gay marriage but we don’t support the amendment either” is bullshit. This kind of splitting hairs is revolting when we’re talking about civil rights, and they’re going to be painted as homo-loving liberals by the GOP no matter what they do. Why not take a principled position rather than some stupid focus group-created one? I will hold my nose and vote for the Democratic candidate, but I can’t say I’m excited about it, unless a miracle happens and we get Kucinich.

[A couple of links in this post are via Atrios/Eschaton.]

The last time I posted about the Education Secretary, he was praising “Christian Values” in the schools. Now he says the teachers union is a terrorist organization:

Education Secretary Rod Paige called the nation’s largest teachers union a “terrorist organization” during a private White House meeting with governors on Monday.

Democratic and Republican governors confirmed the education’s secretary’s remarks about the National Education Association.

“These were the words, ‘The NEA is a terrorist organization,’” said Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle of Wisconsin.

Is anyone else using Time Warner’s DVR (Digital Video Recorder), kind of like Tivo?

Ours is having trouble telling time. It keeps starting things a little early and cutting off the last couple of minutes. I’ve taken to recording the thing right after a program if it really matters to me, just in case.

Is anyone else seeing this? I fear entering the maze of Time Warner Cable support again.

We visited several things of note today. One closed today (Barbara Pollack at Sara Meltzer), but the others are still up.

First, Barbara Pollack, from the press release:

Video Wall: Sara Meltzer Gallery is proud to present Barbara Pollack’s AIM. In this 3-channel video, four teenagers converse via AOL Instant Messenger. The monitors show the faces of the four participants—two boys and two girls—as they react and respond to this digital conversation. This video stems from an off-handed remark, “We don’t flirt at school, we wait until we get home and then IM each other,” made by the son of the artist. In order to capture the humor, spontaneity and frankness of these conversations about sex and dating, Pollack used micro-cameras, a type of surveillance equipment now readily available and frequently used by parents to keep an eye on their children. The work demonstrates the impenetrability of the adolescent experience, even in this era when all forms of privacy seem to have been eliminated.

The gallery’s next show looks quite interesting: Andrea Bowers’s " Nonviolent Civil Disobedience Training" and “Damage” from Type A. We have a few videos of Type A, plus a diptych from the Twins Project.

I have mentioned Hiraki Sawa in the past.

He has three new videos at James Cohan. I will probably go back to see them again. They are quite wonderful.

Francis Cape’s new show opens tonight at Murray Guy. I love his architecturally-inspired art, and I’m not even that into architecture.

Slater Bradley’s “STONED & DETHRONED”, his homage to Kurt Cobain show, opens tonight at Team Gallery. I found it really moving, and not just because I lived in Seattle in 1992. The press release/essay is brilliant. Also, Mr. Bradley curated a group show at Wallspace gallery that should be worth a visit. I haven’t been yet.

Finally, the site hasn’t been updated for the current show, but Axis Gallery has a group show of photography from South Africa. I love the gallery, and it’s a great show. Go!

[Updated: a helpful person gave me the link to the Slater Bradley press release.]