In solidarity with the open letter by some 180 New York Times contributors expressing "serious concerns about editorial bias in the newspaper's reporting on transgender, non-binary, and gender nonconforming people." the State Press Magazine, a publication of Arizona State University's student news organization, The State Press, has called for ASU to divest from its institutional subscription to the New York Times.
Print and digital news, photo and video projects, investigative reporting, and print magazines, "The State Press is ASU's award-winning, student-run news organization that has covered Arizona State University and the Tempe, Phoenix and Mesa communities since 1890."
The call for divestment identifies support for "GLAAD, the largest LGBTQ+ media advocacy organization, [that] published a similar letter, signed by over 100 organizations and individuals. The GLAAD letter called the Times' coverage of trans and gender-diverse people in the past year "irresponsible" and "biased" and said the Times "has repeatedly platformed cisgender (non-transgender) people spreading inaccurate and harmful misinformation about transgender people and issues."
The State Press Magazine call is signed by 32 editors, reporters, photographers, and illustrators, including the Executive Editor, Editor-in-Chief, Managing Editor, Design Editor, and Engagement Editor.
"We have family, friends and fellow State Press Magazine staff members who are trans and gender-diverse. We are highly concerned with the New York Times' coverage of LGBTQ+ people, sources and issues at a time of escalating homophobic and transphobic legislation and violence in the U.S.
In Arizona, the American Civil Liberties Union is currently tracking 11 anti-LGBTQ+ bills advancing in the state Legislature, including SB 1001, which would ban public school teachers from using students' preferred name and pronouns without parental permission and would allow teachers to cite "religious or moral convictions" as legal justification for deliberately misgendering students."
Predictable prediction about the right's predilection to ban, censor, and disavow in the name of free speech and liberty: they will call for the defunding of the State Press.
