The American Family Association’s OneNewsNow site has a standard practice of using the word “homosexual”* instead of “gay” when it comes to, well, gay people. They even set up a filter to automatically make the change.
As has been noted by sites such as Boing Boing and PageOneQ, among others, this practice didn’t serve ONN well when a sprinter named Tyson Gay made news at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials. He suddenly became Tyson Homosexual when the site’s filter got a hold of an AP story. Boing Boing has a screen grab of the hilarity:
But perhaps the best part of the story was this:
Asked how he felt, Homosexual said: ‘A little fatigued.’
The original story is online here. It has been fixed, though no correction or editor’s note was added.
Thanks Richard and Paul!
Update July 2: And the Sun-Sentinel had a Gay-related photo error:
An item in the Daily Digest on Page 1A of Monday’s edition incorrectly identified 100-meter runner Tyson Gay. Gay is shown at right in the photograph. Runner Walter Dix is at left. Link
*Correction June 30: In the first sentence of this post, the word “homophobic” was used instead of “homosexual.” It has been corrected. Thanks, Howard and Julia!
5 Comments
I think in the opening paragraph you mean to state “homosexual instead of gay” rather than “homophobic.” Most of the gay people I know aren’t homophobic, but the majority of them are all homosexual. There are enough homophobic people in this country already, the last thing are homophobic gays.
You may want to issue a correction here…
The American Family Association’s OneNewsNow site has a standard practice of using the word “homophobic” instead of “gay” when it comes to, well, gay people.
Thanks to both of you for spotting that so quickly. I’ve corrected the post.
I wonder if the AP knows the American Family Association is rewriting their copy for editorial purposes.
Tyson is is not gay, but it’s true that gays make terrific sprinters since we’ve been outrunning the bullies in school yards ever since kindergarten!
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