This is outrageous — I cannot believe the damage the *&(% right is doing to this country.
I am a proud, life-long UCCer, and am an active member of Old South Church in Copley Square, Boston. Old South is the third oldest congregation in Boston, and members have included John Adams, Paul Revere, and many other “true Americans”.
CBS and NBC are refusing to air an ad produced by the United Church of Christ (UCC) because it advocates religious inclusion. The ad shows bouncers turning away a variety of people at the door of a church – including ethnic minorities and two men who may bea homosexual couple. The announcer says, “Jesus doesn’t turn people away. Neither do we. No matter who you are or where you are on life’s journey you are welcome here.” (You can watch the advertisement here).
In a letter to the UCC, CBS is refusing to air the advertisement because the commercial “touches on the exclusion of gay couples and other minority groups by other individuals and organizations.” Also, CBS found the ad “unacceptable” because “the Executive Branch has recently proposed a Constitutional Amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman.” NBC similarly declared the ad “too
controversial.” The ad has been accepted and will air on a number of networks, including ABC Family, AMC, BET, Discovery, Fox, Hallmark, History, Nick@Nite, TBS, TNT, Travel and TV Land.
Email CBS and NBC and tellthem to air the advertisement because everyone in this country – not just the Bush administration – should be able to freely express their opinions.
I truly hope that this is an email hoax, but I fear that it is not.
on Dec 3rd, 2004 at 1:12 pm
It’s no hoax. More like a hijacking of what’s left of our democracy by extreme reactionaries — the term “far right” longer begins to describes the lengths these folks aided and abetted by the media. On a positive note, I’ve been checking out your blog for the past month and really find a lot of your tips and shortcuts helpful. I’ll be back in touch. Bob
on Dec 3rd, 2004 at 3:18 pm
David – I’ve published the link on my weblog, too. Thanks for sharing it.
on Dec 4th, 2004 at 3:51 pm
Just an update on this:
It turns out that this refusal had a positive side effect — news outlets around the country are covering this story as a news event, so the ad is getting more play than we could have ever paid for.
on Dec 26th, 2004 at 5:03 am
Hi David. If “the right is wrong” how do we explain Fox airing the ad? You’re right. When the ad made the news everybody heard it, even me.
On the subject of worms, our office network has been hit twice by a worm, trojan, virus, who knows? All I know is the computer goes wild with pop up ads (not UCC) and default settings are changed. And all this after spending big a$$ bucks for virus protection. The punishment for causing these problems should be life in prison and without computer privileges, please.
Remember C-SUN?
on Mar 19th, 2006 at 6:57 pm
If absense makes the heart grow fonder, some people must really love church.