Topic: WorldNetDaily
Over the past few days, WorldNetDaily engaged in numerous examples of the depiction-equals-endorsement fallacy as it relates to homosexuality.
An Oct. 4 article stated as fact that California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger "signed a bill terminating the last vestige of traditional marriage," a bill that would allow allow domestic partners to file personal income taxes by checking either "married filing jointly" or "married filing separately" categories. The article forwards the claim from "those assessing the results of this year's state legislature" that Schwarzenegger "has failed to fully protect school children from the 'gay' agenda"-- misleading since the article cites only two conservative groups and no non-conservatives to support it. The article also cited a "weblog participant" -- in fact, a poster at the right-wing Free Republic -- as describing the bill as "lesbolation," concluding that "California really needs a political enema."
An Oct. 7 follow-up article seems to endorse anarchy, declaring that "'Don't trust the courts' is what supporters of traditional marriage are saying." Again, only conservatives are quoted, and their claims are not countered.
An Oct. 5 article declared that "[t]he Philadelphia School District has launched a new advance in the battle to indoctrinate school children into the 'gay' agenda" by establishing a "Gay and Lesbian History Month." The article quotes a anti-homosexual activist claiming without evidence that "even elementary school phonics cards have been through the 'gay' editing process." But no examples of the "Gay and Lesbian History Month" are offered, let alone how depictions of gays and lesbians equals "indoctrinat[ing] school children into the 'gay' agenda."
In an Oct. 6 article misleadingly headlined "'Gay' groups: We have rights to your children!" WND claimed that "[a] collection of 'gay' organizations has filed a friend-of-the-court brief in a Massachusetts lawsuit, claiming they have every right to teach their doctrine to grade-school students." In fact, the brief -- as quoted by WND -- states that "Parental rights, according to the brief filed this week, "have never meant that a parent can demand prior notice and the right to opt a child out of mere exposure to ideas in the public schools that a parent disapproves of."
Nevertheless, WND quotes unchallenged a claim from a "pro-family" group that homosexuals want to "push their message on children," adding that the "true agenda" of the sponsors of the brief "is apparent in the demands that the state has a legal obligation to teach homosexual issues to young children in the public schools."
