Course Evaluation

This course has been filled with a variety of news stories, blog posts, and quirky side stories.  It's been nice to become more informed about news stories and actually see how different stories are spread across multiple sources.  I found the most interesting part of this course actually came when writing our last essay about following a news story across different media.  I followed how the overturning of Prop 8 became a big media story in February of 2012.  It was interesting to see how one paper close in California reported on it compared to how The New York Times reported on it and then to see the millions of different spin-offs of the issue.  You never really realize how much a story expands until you look at a variety of different sources. I hope to use my knowledge of connecting sources to get a broader view of the news spectrum and not take everything I see or read at face value.

The Wedding Aisle to Gay Marriage

Allison Proehl

Professor Eric Leake

Writing

Blog Following Essay

The Wedding Aisle to Gay Marriage

            Same-sex marriage has been a controversial issue since the stories of Adam and Eve were first written. Across the nation it has been one of the largest social issues that the National Court system has left for the states to decide. On February 7, 2012 the Appeals Court of California in a 2-1 verdict, made the ruling to overturn Proposition 8. From their ruling came a hurricane of TV reports, blogs, articles, and more than ever a full fledge media discussion about the recent ruling. When the ruling to overturn Prop 8 emerged at the beginning of February of this year, the legalities of same-sex marriage awoke fierce debate between supporters of same-sex couples and those in opposition of gay marriage. By analyzing the blogs and articles written about the Appeals Court’s decision to over turn Proposition 8 we can gain a better understanding about how the flow of information circulates and is discussed. This blogosphere of information also allows readers to track the effect this court case has on state and national law regarding same-sex marriage.

            The California’s Appeals Court’s controversial decision to overturn Proposition 8 started a media frenzy.  The press have written articles and blogs about the decision and the possibility of what will happen next regarding the legalities of same-sex marriage.  After the final 2-1 decision was announced major media stations began to respond to the outcome. Since the whole decision was based upon California law, it’s important to take a close look at Newspapers in California. The L.A. Times was one of the major papers that immediately put out an article regarding Prop 8.  While reading the article, it is apparent, first from the rainbow flag picture that dominates the page, the title, and then the word choice of the author Erwin Chemerinsky, although the article tries to be unbiased there is a definite support of gay marriage throughout it. Although there is a Pro-gay marriage voice to the article Chemerinsky does a good job at looking at the logistics of Prop 8.  Unlike most of the other articles written, he chose to write about how Prop 8 should never have been put on the ballot back in 2008. “The ban on marriage equality for gays and lesbians serves no legitimate government interest. Under this reasoning — though it was not the holding of the case — any law denying marriage equality would be unconstitutional” (Chemerinsky). This is a very refreshing view that differs from the articles that are written completely on the moral issue of gay marriage and not on the legal ones.  In the L.A. Times’ article there is also a strong presence of practicality. Statistics that supporters of Prop 8 commonly use as grounds to deny gays and lesbians the right to marry are disproved. He writes about how marriage is designed to encourage procreation, yet heterosexual couples who either are enable or unwilling to procreate are still allowed to marry and gays and lesbians are not.  I really liked how practical his article was and how it took a majority of the arguments used by supporters of Prop 8 and put them to rest.  From this article the information regarding the Appeal Court’s decision is spread to all readers of the L.A. Times, as well as it gives a close up view of the court proceedings that are happening in the L.A. Times’ home state of California.

One of the other significant networks that responded to the recent ruling was the newspaper, The New York Times. As a result of the high sensitivity and controversy over same-sex marriage it was apparent that the Times wanted to report on the issue without bias. On February 7, 2012 the Times reported on the case, reporting the Appeals Court’s decision to overturn Prop 8. Their article gave a general history of the different court cases that same-sex marriage has battled and gave equal space for those in favor of gay marriage as well as those against it. The main focus of the article was not only to report on this extremely controversial issue but also to draw attention to the future of gay marriage at a national level. “Both sides in the case made clear that they intended to take the case before the Supreme Court in hopes of prompting it to settle once and for all an issue that has been fought out in courts, legislatures and ballot boxes since at least a 1971 case” (Nagourney). With the publication of this article regarding gay marriage (as well as 4 others on the same topic) the issues was spread to millions of readers.  On the NY Times’ article ‘Court Strikes Down Ban on Gay Marriage in California,’ over 1200 comments were posted regarding the subject matter thus expanding the conversation surrounding the decision to overturn Proposition 8.  In Nagourney’s article about gay marriage he links to the American Foundation for Equal Rights. The American Foundation for Equal Rights (AFER) became the sole backer for the Perry v. Brown case which lead to the overturning of Prop 8.  Thus the blogosphere not only includes the Appellate Court’s decision but also the L.A. and New York Times’ articles, and AFER’s response to the verdict.

After the release of California’s Appeals Court’s decision to overturn Proposition 8 and the New York Times’ article about the court’s decision, the articles regarding the legality and right for gays to marry expanded to the American Foundation for Equal Rights’ website.  From the NY Times’ link to the AFER website, there is an article regarding the organization’s joy in the trial’s outcome as well as multiple reasons why they believed that Prop 8 should be overturned.  AFER Board President Chad Griffin was reported saying, “Every American, regardless of race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, deserves the same dignity and respect, the same freedom to love and to marry and to build a family” (U.S. Court of Appeals). This article along with the AFER websites is clearly in support of not only gay marriage but also fundamental rights that are written in the U.S. Constitution that gays have been denied.  I think they do a good job in their article about ‘furthering’ the conversation as Harris puts it. They not only acknowledge that Prop 8 was overturned but they point out sections in the Constitution that gays and lesbians are being denied. AFER expands the conversation from one Proposition against gay marriage and extends it to include basic human rights that the law has ignored. They take notice of ‘human dignity’ regardless of race, sexual orientation, or ethnicity and recognize that gays and lesbians are being denied both the right to marry and the right to be treated with equal dignity and respect under the law. After the release of the Ninth Districts decision and the publication of the article ‘U.S. Court of Appeals Uphold Federal District Court Ruling that Proposition 8 is Unconstitutional’ on its website the blogosphere is once again expanded to include more than 100,000 followers of AFER along with the thousands that found the original article on the New York Times’ website. 

In order to stay unbiased in his article regarding gay marriage, New York Times’ writer Adam Nagourney not only links to the American Foundation for Equal Rights but also to Protect Marriage.com. The Protect Marriage website expands the discussion about the Ninth Districts ruling on gay marriage to include those who support Proposition 8 and thus are against gay marriage. As a result of the Appeals Court ruling against Prop 8, it is appropriate that Protect Marriage’s main focus in their article is to counter the Court’s decision. Their main goal is to preserve the term ‘marriage’ for the union of a man and a woman and they use this notion in furthering their argument against those that support gay marriage. In their article they do not just disagree with the Court’s decision they “push beyond mere disagreement” (Harris 56).  The article opens up new lines of inquiry that the New York Times and American foundation for Equal Rights does not consider. They bring up the previous decision as decided by the voters of California back in 2008 and try to add that to their argument against gay marriage. “The panel’s ruling mischaracterized the purpose of marriage, failed to faithfully and fairly interpret the Constitution, and disregarded every relevant appellate and Supreme Court precedent in American history” (Hass).  Those in favor of Prop 8 are attempting to further their campaign by appealing to all of the Ninth District’s Judges and get the public’s support behind them by reaching out to their 100,000 followers.  Once again the blogosphere has increased from the first release of the CA Appeals Court’s decision, then from the L.A. and New York Times’ article summarizing the decision, and then finally it is expanded to both sides of the controversy. Readers of the L.A. and NY Times, American Foundation for Equal Rights, and Protect Marriage are all included in the blogosphere and thus the flow of information that was all spun from the result of the overturning of Proposition 8.

             As a consequence of California’s Appeals Court’s Decision to overturn Proposition 8, a national discussion regarding gay marriage was seen across the news and Internet.  The Court’s judgment sparked articles by major news publishers like the L.A. and New York Times, which has thousands of readers commenting on the article.  The opinions of both those in favor of gay marriage and those against it were both linked in the New York Times’ article and thus expanded the flow of information from a few thousand readers of the Times to millions of readers from multiple websites and blogs. By tracing the flow of how the overturning of Proposition 8 is being interpreted by multiple groups we are better able to understand the blogosphere’s affect on the nation.

Works Cited:

Chemerinsky, Erwin. "Prop. 8 Ruling: The Legal Path Ahead." Los Angeles Times.

     N.p., 8 Feb. 2012. Web. 5 Mar. 2012. <http://www.latimes.com/news/

     opinion/commentary/

     la-oe-chemerinsky-proposition-8-ruling-20120208,0,5128797.story>.

Harris, Joseph. Rewriting. Logan, Utah: Utah State UP, 2006. Print.

Hass, Carla. Official Proponents Appeal Prop 8 Decision to Entire 9th Circuit.

     Protect Marriage, 21 Feb. 2012. Web. 27 Feb. 2012.

     http://www.protectmarriage.com/blog/

Nagourney, Adam. "Court Strikes Down Ban on Gay Marriage in California." The New

     York Times. N.p., 10 Feb. 2012. Web. 27 Feb. 2012.

     <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/08/us/

     marriage-ban-violates-constitution-court-rules.html?scp=7&sq=prop%208%20overturne

     d&st=cse>.

"U.S. Court of Appeals Upholds Federal District Court Ruling That Proposition 8

     Is Unconstitutional." American Foundation for Equal Rights. N.p., 8 Feb.

     2012. Web. 27 Feb. 2012. <http://www.afer.org/news/

     u-s-court-of-appeals-upholds-federal-district-court-ruling-that-proposition-8-is-

     unconstitutional/>.

Extra Gay Marriage History in California (not part of the essay, just informative): In 2000 California enacted Prop 22, which stated that only the marriage between a man and a woman would be recognize in the state of California. This was closely followed by The Domestic Partnership Act in 2003 which gave the general benefits that those in opposite-sex marriages received to same-sex civil unions.  However civil union did not get the full benefits of opposite-sex couples, thus in 2004 Prop 22 was challenged and eventually invalidated.  Thus the opposing party of gay marriage enacted Prop 8. Prop 8 stated it did not recognize same-sex marriages in the state of California and eventually passed in California with a 52.3% approval.  As a small stipulation the court decided that the some 18,000 plus same-sex marriages that were preformed in California would not be nullified.  However same-sex couples were denied the right to the title of “marriage” thus in 2009, same-sex couples K. Perry and S. Stier and P. Katami and J. Zarrillo filed suit to get Prop 8 overturned. In August of 2010 U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn R. Walker overturned Prop 8. After considering Walker’s injunction a the Appeals Court decided that Proposition 8 was unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause as well as it violated the Equal Protection Clause. On February 7,2012 the Appeals Court made the final decision to overturn Proposition 8.

The New York Times...Revised

I chose to revise this post a bit because I felt like I didn’t really add anything to the conversation about why the New York Times is such a credible source of information. In this post I attempted to accurately talk about why the NY Times is a good source of news as well as add multiple statistics to my post to add accuracy.

Informative.  That’s the first thing that comes to mind—mostly because I really didn’t read the newspaper very often prior to taking this specific writing course.  The New York Times has been known to be a credible source of news.  However it has also been known to have a strong liberal bias. The New York Times has been a strong news present since 1851 and is one of the top news cites looked at in the U.S. It is ranked 31^st in the United States of top sites visited according to ‘Alexa-The Web Information Company.’ I’ve found that the NY Times has a pretty large audience—currently 447,327 sites have the NY times linked to their website.  Originally I was skeptical at the power the NY Times had on the American people, but I’ve found that a lot of people agree the NY Times is a very credible news source and one of the top sources visited. It’s estimated that about 16,355,042 Unique Visitors (individuals who visit the site at least once a month according to complete.com) visit the NY Times at least once a month.  And that statistic doesn’t even count the number of people that look at the NY Times multiple times a month or the people who read the hard copy.

 However I do not read the NY Times the traditional way.  I read it on NYTimes.com or on the app on my phone.  Although they report the same headlines, the way they are displayed couldn’t be more different.  A newspaper has only what is printed and usually on the front cover there is a huge photo to catch readers eyes.  On their website there are short blurbs on the main headlines and then click-able links that lead to the entire article as well as other links that are similar to the article’s topic.  Links to other websites have major appeal because they allow readers to continue reading more news. 

Trying to Take an Approach

            I found Harris’s definition of “Taking an Approach” to be a bit muddled and hard to follow.  I felt like in this chapter he was a bit scatterbrained about what taking an approach really meant.  I did draw from the chapter that he kind of saw it as not rewriting passages or ideas from a text but another writer’s mode or style of working.  I think he is suggesting that to be a proficient writer you can’t just rely on redoing what other writers have done, but you can use other writer’s style of writing. I think a good example of this can be found in artist movements like Renaissance, Baroque, Romanticism, Realism, Impressionism, Cubism, Expressionism, and Modernism…etc.  Pablo Picasso is well known for his abstract cubism paintings that sparked a new way to paint.  The other painters of that era didn’t just recreate one of Picasso’s paintings; instead they reinvented it and made it their own. This is also a good place I think Harris’s idea of “Reflexivity” fits in.  Like for many painters and writers, there is a sense of ‘self’ in whatever they are creating.  Although big websites like the New York Times and Business Insider can’t really reflect in their news articles, I do think they are reflective in what quotes they choose to print in their articles.  In that way the writer is making the news story his or her own.  From the style of the NY Times you can tell the writers are sticking to the style of the other writers of the Times, but they are also adding their own spin on topics.  I think this is a semi accurate example of how the NY Times is “Taking an Approach.”

The Daily Show and Countering

Harris’s definition of countering is “bringing a different set of interests to bear upon a subject, look to notice what others have not.  Your aim is not to refute what has been said before, to bring the discussion to an end, but to respond to prior views in ways that move the conversation in new directions” (56).  Although The Daily Show isn’t a blog I think it acts rather closely to one and does an excellent job of ‘countering’.  I like following/watching Jon Stewart for one the entertainment, but also because he talks about a lot about issues that newspapers cover, yet his show is more appealing and easier to understand way.  Stewart’s recent show on February 15, 2012 does a nice job in not only furthering the conversation on insider trading but also bringing a different set of interests to the conversation.  Originally 60 Minutes brings up how although for regular Americans can be prosecuted for using insider trading information in order to buy/sell stocks it is still legal for congress men and women to use their inside information in order to either help Hedge funds or to buy their own stocks.  The reason I think The Daily Show does a good job in countering is because he questions Congress when they say they want to pass a bill that hold Congress accountable like every other American.  I think Stewart furthers the conversation by first taking what 60 minutes has to say as well as countering Congress by sarcastically stating, “Oh right, it’s ridiculous to expect that Congress should be held under the same rules as regular Americans.”  I think this doesn’t just stop the conversation like most arguments do—it furthers the conversation by looking at another angle.  Stewart constantly tries to look at news stories from different angles without just blatantly putting down the opposing argument.

RE: RE: RE: Forwarding...

            Right from the beginning of Harris’s ‘Forwarding’ chapter I like his general concept of adding to a conversation.  I never really realized it but the reason you talk to other people is to add knowledge or wisdom to the discussion.  Of course there are times where the sole goal of making a comment is to end a conversation—but for the most part Harris says it is to push the conversation forward, “to say something new, something that seem to call for further talk and writing” (35-36).  That really is the perfect way to describe blogs.  The blog I’ve been following—Business Insider is made for people to add to the conversation, maybe not in the traditional sense but there is still that response to forward the conversation.  While browsing through Business Insider’s website you can find multiple ways to ‘forward’ the conversation.  Harris describes forwarding by using email as an example, “In the email program I use, these two functions are illustrated by opposing arrows: reply (ß) send your comment back to the sender; forward (à) directs them outward to other readers.  And these forwards can themselves be forwarded, to sometimes unexpected sites and publics—as anyone who has ever written an email post that seemed to take on a life of its own, found its way to unintended readers, can testify” (37).  Even I can testify to this type of treatment of my writing, aka Facebook.  There are tons of times where something posted on Facebook gets commented on and then reposted and added to and revised.  The same happens with Business Insider’s website, as far as I can tell the articles don’t get revised but they do get commented on often reposted on other websites.  I think this is exactly what Harris is referring to—in someway contributing to the conversation.  Recently I’ve been reading some of the comments posted on the main articles on BI and there are some very interesting comments that actually add to the conversation.  However on the other hand there are comments such as, “@BI all over the plase: Or in other words...The Cancer otherwise called OBAMA”  Or sarcastic rhetorical comments that really have no place in the conversation. That is one of Harris’s worries about forwarding, “In forwarding text, you begin to shift the focus of your readers away from what its author has to say and toward your own project” (38).  Honestly that really is an increasing problem—there often becomes a lot of opinion thrown into the conversation and thus it is altered.  Now in some aspect I’m sure that shifting the conversation can be beneficial, but I’m not entirely convinced that forwarding is all good.

Sharing the NYTimes

            Like any big company that’s trying to compete in today’s economy, it is vital to have a website that provides not only information about your company but also links to things that are relevant.  Originally The New York Times refused to create a NYTimes website—but as the times changed it became apparent that the only way to keep their business afloat was to make a website that projected their news stories.  The NYTimes does a good job in laying out their site basically the same as they do in their newspaper, the only real distinct difference is the links that each story have attached to it.  Under the main headlines and short blurbs about the article and then a link to the article as well other links about the story.  This is a good representation of a press-sphere—The NYTimes no longer is just reporting for our benefit.  They are reporting for us to not only read but to respond to.  Any article on the NYTimes website has links to Facebook, Twitter, Linkdin, as well as a way to email the article and a way to comment on the article.  Similar to what Jeff Jarvis wrote about creating a circular flow of news, is what the NYTimes has done. 

            Recently I’ve been following the website Business Insider—which really embodies the press-sphere.  On their homepage (unlike the NYT) readers can immediately long in through Facebook or Twitter in order to share articles.  Their website allows users to signup for emails and alerts and of course comment on the many articles they have posted.  On both the NYTimes website and on Business Insider there is audience participation.  Commenting, sharing, and linking to other websites creates a press-sphere that is focused around the reader; it’s a cycle of being informed and then sharing that information.