The AJC’s failure to cover the 2010 Atlanta Pride festival left a sour taste in the mouths of many queer Atlantans, including James Parker Sheffield, Executive Director of the Atlanta Pride Committee.
Sheffield said in October on the lack of coverage: “The parade [on Sunday] is the largest on-street event in the city and the state. I’m absolutely shocked.”
Not only is the Pride festival the largest gay gathering in the state, it’s one of the largest annual Pride events in the country. GLAAD should have pressed the AJC for a promise of future coverage of local gay events, not reward it.
Even one of the AJC’s reporters wrote in the comment section of a Creative Loafing article online last November that the festival didn’t merit coverage.
If that’s not enough, Project Q Atlanta recently covered the AJC’s use of the offensive term “transvestite” to describe a cross-dressed crime suspect. As Project Q notes, use of the term violates GLAAD’s style guide for covering LGBT issues.
GLAAD’s recognition of the “outstanding” work being done by the AJC is a more than a little confusing. Media outlets that intentionally don’t cover the gay community shouldn’t be recognized for their excellent work covering gay issues.
We reached out to GLAAD on the nomination process, but we haven’t heard from them as of yet. When we receive their response, we’ll post it.
To view this year’s nominees (in all categories), please click here.