| Matt Wickenheiser, writing in the PPH, has more on NPR sending a cease and desist notice to Stand for Marriage Maine (S4MM), which says that "any use of NPR content in this manner will stop immediately."
The notice regards the use of audio clips by S4MM in an ad that I wrote about last night, Give Me a Break. A statement issued by NPR reads:
NPR did not license use of this story or its content, and would certainly not have licensed or permitted it if we had been asked. NPR is a highly respected news organization and does not allow its content to be used by political or advocacy groups. Such use is harmful to the integrity and independence of NPR. NPR does allow - even encourage -- personal, non-commercial use of our content, so long as it is not modified, and not used in a manner that suggests NPR promotes or endorses a cause, idea, Web site, product or service. The use made by Stand for Marriage Maine violated all of these terms.
In the ad, a small portion of the NPR story from 2004 is played, describing how a teacher in Massachusetts - which the ad fails to note teaches sex education - speaks about sexuality to her 8th grade students. It comes from Massachusetts schools weigh gay topics, which examined how public schools in the Bay State were reacting to that state's court ruling allowing same-sex couples to marry.
Despite a recent claim by the head of S4MM, Marc Mutty, that "We [S4MM] have never said that schools will be mandated -- or actually perhaps we did in one ad, or certainly led people to believe that inadvertently," this latest ad clearly intends to convince viewers that allowing same-sex couples will impact the curricula of schools in Maine.
Mutty's claims that they inadvertently misled viewers is bullshit, of course, since from the same NPR story one finds:
In Massachusetts, local districts have broad discretion when it comes to sex ed, and schools range from this one in Brookline to many others that teach abstinence only to no sex ed at all.
This is exactly what many have said in rebutting the claim from S4MM that "gay marriage" will be taught in Maine's public schools (whatever that means). It further tars the credibility of S4MM in that they ignored this important information from the same story in which they took the quote that forced NPR to file its order.
It is now incumbent on the Maine's news media to fully examine all the claims made by S4MM and Marc Mutty, and to explain to their readers how far they have stretched the truth - and in some cases lied - to promote their cause. |
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