It's been a strange news day here in England, outrage has poured out from the gay community after one of the biggest selling national daily newspapers, 'The Sun' decided to publish a poll following David Laws's resignation, asking if gay people should be allowed to be cabinet ministers!
Yes, the paper, actually asked that very questions, should gay people be allowed to be cabinet ministers! First of all, you should know that The Sun is not the most highbrow of newspapers, it has a long history of disguised homophobia and sensationalism. So for them to run such a poll, pose such a question is, well, to be honest, kind of expected.
The poll, yesterday was conducted by research firm YouGov, of which I am a respondent for, asked three questions relating to the resignation of treasury chief secretary Laws after he admitted paying rent to his partner, James Lundie. One of the questions was "Should gay people be cabinet ministers?"
A total of 89% of the 958 people polled either actively supported or were accepting of gay cabinet ministers, 13% saying it is "a good thing" while 76% did not mind. Out of the rest, 5% didn't have a view and a further 5% said gay cabinet ministers were "a bad thing".
The paper wasn't exactly going over board to press home the positive message in favor of gay minsters, and there as a great deal of criticism leveled at the paper, both online in forums and Twitter, along with the odd few newspapers that are not still bastions of homophobia.
Patrick Strudwick highlights the problem that is currently afflicting the dying British Newspaper industry - the papers are out of touch with the population, at least as far as gay rights go. Back in the old days, say in the late 80's you'd have The Sun's editor at the time, David Yelland making statements that the paper was to change its approach gays in public life. "The Sun is no longer in the business of destroying closet gays' lives by 'exposing' them as homosexuals," he said at the time. Yet, that didn't stop its reporters of digging deep or paying vast amounts of money to get an expose, where the only real issue was someones sexuality. Nothing much changes, they still do the same today and most of the time, there isn't really a story there in the first place.
It's about time the British newspaper industry as a whole, caught up with the times, and embraced the fact that we live in a more enlightened time, I mean, us gay folk, well we've even got the vote! With circulations falling faster that England's chances of winning inEurovision songs contests, you'd think they would take care of what few readers they've still got!
Jason Shaw
Jason is GayAgenda.com's UK Correspondent, he also writes a daily blog The Seafront Diaries an slightly eccentric tale of life from England's southern coast.
© 2010 Copyright Jason Shaw
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