UPDATED
Concerned Women for America has an internship program in which they train young women to be culture warriors against those who don’t share CWA’s view of how the world should be. Part of this training appears to be writing negative and accusatory articles about the gay community.
Molly Hamrick, a recent graduate with a degree in Political Communications from Bryan College, took a claim by Peter LaBarbera that the Gay Games was “a flop” and paraphrased this as “Gay Games VII is the third “gay” event that has failed financially”. However, the Washington Blade reports
Organizers in Chicago said this week they expect to post a profit after final numbers are tallied in August.
“We’re projecting a surplus,” said Gay Games spokesperson Phyllis Jones, “but I can’t tell you if that’s a million dollars or two dollars.”
This is not the first time that a CWA intern repeated a story that was untruthful. The following is my email to CWA advising them of their inaccuracy:
Molly Hamrick’s article about the Gay Games VII in Chicago is incorrect. In it, Ms. Hamrick states “Gay Games VII is the third “gay” event that has failed financially;…”
Actually, the Gay Games VII did not fail financially. While the final numbers have not yet been made available, projections show the organizers expecting a profit.
Please revise your article accordingly.
Hamrick relied heavily on Peter LaBarbera’s reporting. However, she forgot that LaBarbera writes in a manner to deceive, using words that may be technically correct but imply something that is not true. In this case, LaBarbera suggested that the Gaymes were financially insolvent by calling them “a flop”. But LaBarbera was simply claiming that they were a flop by his definition while leaving the reader to think otherwise.
Ms Hamrick is no doubt young and has not yet learned that when you use as a source those who have no commitment to objective truth but instead rely on innuendo and deception to fight their battles in the culture war, you will unwittingly be an instrument of deception and lies.
And that should make any honest woman concerned.
UPDATE
Gay Games VII reports that attendance was 40% greater than expected and that for the events which were ticketed, ticket sales were 50% above projected. The organization will release financial details before 9/30 but are predicting a surplus.
It is highly unlikely that CWA or LaBarbera will revise their report to allign with reality. Honesty doesn’t appear to be very important to either of them.
Wasn’t LaBarbara fired from there for a reason?
I hope Molly meant well. I don’t know if any of them do.
You’d think the first thing anyone would learn about researching a story would be to look at first-hand resources.
Wait… Concerned Woman for America has an actual woman on staff?!
Oh…she knew fully well that Peter LaBarbera isn’t known for accuracy. Even if she didn’t, she had no attributable source to verify her false statement.
Since she is merely an intern, I wonder what journalism school is going to take responsibility for producing this hack?
Oh my. As a resident of Rhea County, I past Bryan College on my way to the Wal-Mart in Dayton, home of the famous 1925 Scopes trial.
I’ll have to send Ms. Hamrick a note telling her to shape up, her college town folks expect better of her. 😉
These so-called “Concerned Women” are only concerned with one thing: forwarding the right-wing agenda. They aren’t “concerned” about women who live in poverty. They aren’t “concerned” about women who lack access to healthcare. They aren’t “concerned” about women who are raped or otherwise abused. They are only “concerned” with the GOP’s wedge issue du jour.
Lest these “concerned women” forget, lesbians are women. Why aren’t they more “concerned” about the challenges lesbians face in society, the workplace, etc.? Also, many many women have gay children. Why aren’t they “concerned” about those women, who have to live every day seeing and hearing their children being defamed and discriminated against by these “concerned” folks and their ilk?
Because, dear Jonathon, they are, as I like to put it, kapos to the patriarchy. they are obsessed with what Tim LaHaye and Daddy Dobson want.