San Diego holds largest equality march in country and local media blows it
Between 20,000-25,000 marched from Hillcrest, through downtown, to the County Administration Building yesterday, motivated by passage of Prop. 8 to speak out for the right of same-sex couples to marry. Not only did San Diego have the largest demonstration (as Kelly mentions in the post below), among hundreds of protests throughout the country yesterday, San Diego’s turnout was twice as large as those in San Francisco and L.A. Since protests against the Vietnam War, it was the largest street demonstration in San Diego history, after the immigrant rights’ march of over 50,000 in 2006.
After the protest, I went home to watch the local news coverage. None of the local TV reports I saw mentioned that SD had the largest turnout in the country (and maybe the world, as there were simultaneous protests in several other countries). Channels 6 (XETV) and 10 (KGTV) had the most positive coverage of the demonstration, but didn’t mention the historical significance, while KUSI had the worst (underreported and buried within a story on Prop. 8 called “Debate Rages On”). I will watch the coverage again today on KGTV, KFMB, KUSI, XETV and see if they get it right.
It’s important when San Diego has a bigger gay rights demonstration than San Francisco for local news coverage to point it out because it challenges the outdated myth that San Diego is merely a sleepy conservative little town.
Update: Sunday’s reporting:
KFMB made it the 4th story in the evening, after the fires, the killing in Mission Beach, and the Charger’s loss. They reported that SD had approx. 25, 000 but again left out that it was larger than any other demo. They led the segment with the Governator saying it would go back to the Supreme Court, and closed the segment with this shockingly anti-democratic statement: “Prop. 8 supporters say the marches have gone too far and are intended to intimidate those who voted for the measure.” Nice last word, Channel 8.
Saw the other network broadcasts at 10 & 11pm. None of them talked about the protests at all. It’s old news now. Gotta talk about fighting and shooting.
I checked the LA Times and New York Times on Saturday–they talked about LA and San Francisco, but said nothing about San Diego. C’mon, editors! You have access to the AP wire. Math may not be the strong suit of most journalists, but even I know that 20,000 is more than 10,000 or 7,500. Pretty sad.
Thanks for the report, Pam. I’m not surprised. Lazy media. Fortunately this is not the end of momentum against inequality!
Sure it’s sad that the media coverage was lacking after the event. But, I’m bummed I didn’t know about the event *before* it happened. And I’m pretty active online on the No On 8, tip, and didn’t hear a thing.
They marched right by my house, and I would have loved to jump in and bring my baby boy for the ride — if I had only known! We went for a walk that day anyway. I found out about it, not on TV or the Internets, but because I ran into some folks whilst getting my burrito from La Salsa at Horton Plaza who were fresh and sweaty from the event. They were wearing these super-cool t-shirts that one of the guys designed. He gave me their cafepress link if you wanna check it and buy one:
http://www.cafepress.com/marriagefoall