HUFFINGTON
12.09.12
OUT AT THE TIMES
The Times went after the
New York State legislature on several issues,
not only demanding passage of a hate-crimes
bill stalled by antigay
Republicans in the state
senate but also calling
for something far more
radical: complete civil
rights for lesbians and
gay men. The behavior of
the Ancient Order of Hibernians, the organizers
of the St. Patrick’s Day
parade, was “deplorable,”
according to The Times.
And Marvel Comics was
given a pat on the back
for breaking ground in
having one of its superheroes, Northstar, come
out of the closet. Said
The Times: “Mainstream
culture will one day make
its peace with gay Americans. When that time
comes, Northstar’s revelation will be seen for
what it is: a welcome indicator of social change.”
Op-ed page columnist
Anna Quindlen, who’s
always been out-front
on gay and AIDS issues,
seemed more personally
moved by the AIDS crisis, writing, “This is what
AIDS looks like — good
people, lovable people,
people you want to hug.”
Even op-ed columnist
and former Times executive editor A.M. “Abe’’
Rosenthal, long reviled
by many gays and lesbians as the most homophobic force at The
Times, went through a
surprising transformation. As executive editor
during the early and mid
‘80s, Rosenthal had The
Times virtually ignore the
AIDS crisis. “The lack
of coverage in the early
years of the epidemic was
just criminal,” notes Ste-
phen Miller, a spokesman
for the New York chapter
of the Gay and Lesbian
Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD). But in
1991 Rosenthal wrote a
column assailing Bush for
remaining “silent” on the
epidemic. ln yet another
column last year, the man
who some say tyrannized
gays and lesbians at The
Times for many years and
who wouldn’t even allow
the word gay to be used
in the paper, declared
that “harassment and
assault of gay men
and lesbians is an illness
in our society.”
To the the astute lesbian and gay reader, it
was all very clear: Something had happened at
The New York Times.
JEFF SCHMALZ HAS SPENT
MORE THAN HALF OF HIS LIFE
AT THE TIMES. He began there 20 years
ago, at the age of 18, as a copyboy, and worked his
way up to the position of deputy national editor.
His path from there would be easy to predict: He’d
probably become national editor in a short time,
after current national editor Soma Golden retired or
moved on. “I’d have gone to work abroad for a year
or two first before taking over the national editor