Media defend gay rights issues: Liberal bias or doing their duty?

Issues from the LGBT community permeated news cycles during the month of February.

Missouri defensive end Michael Sam came out and is set to become the first openly gay player to play in the NFL. Media overwhelmingly supported Sam (story). The Texas Supreme Court struck down Texas’ gay marriage law and on the same day, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer vetoed a law that would have allowed business owners and others protection should they be sued over refusing service due to religious reasons.

Media have overwhelmingly supported these stories, providing enough criticism in the Arizona case that many of the senators who actually voted for the bill asked Brewer to veto it.

All this support for LGBT issues begs the question – is this the liberal media at work? After all, a recent Pew Poll says that the United States is currently split at about 53-47 percent in favor of gay marriage. But the press overwhelmingly supported vetoing the Arizona bill and described it as unfair and discriminatory.  Even Fox News came out in favor of Brewer’s veto.

In fact, one has to resort to conservative blogs to find consistent stories that support the bill in Arizona, that bemoan Sam’s announcement and that believe the Texas Supreme Court got it wrong (here and here).

So why are media reporting in favor of gay rights when so many in the country (47 percent is a lot of people) clearly disagree?

One answer could be found in deontological ethics. Deontological ethics relies on a sense of duty; one is expected to do what is right because of an obligation to a set of rules. Journalists have a duty to report news as it happens and an obligation to report accurately what is happening.

The Arizona bill followed a failed attempt at basically the same thing in Kansas, but when the bill passed in Arizona, businesses like Apple, Major League Baseball and the National Football League all weighed in with their opinions. Media reported that. The Texas Supreme Court followed the law, taking its example from last summer’s Supreme Court ruling on the Defense of Marriage Act. Law and history seem to be working hand in hand with the LGBT community and media members are much more likely to follow their example when writing about current issues.

Those opposed are often relying on religion as their primary reason for opposing gay marriage and for not accepting athletes like Michael Sam. Don’t forget, religion was used to defend slavery, religion was used to wage war on the Jews and religion was used to defend Jim Crow (here and here.) It took the work of many dedicated people and a large number of journalists to shine the light on the darkness of Jim Crow and it’s a different brand of journalists making the same arguments for gay rights. This coverage of gay rights events is not an example of the liberal media, it’s an example of media doing their duty and doing their job.