What the late LDS leader Gordon Hinckley knew at the time was that he needed to hook up a church with a better rep (ha!) to front for it - the Catholic church. Here is a report on the strategy memo:
In the above report, the church doesn't question the memo's validity, in fact, the sources said there are other related documents that could surface. One snippet of the LDS memo underscores the level of hate the church has for gays (HLM refers to "homosexual legal marriage"):
50-State Join the Impact!
Please note especially the last paragraph. "There may have to be certain legal rights recognized for unmarried people..." Take a look at what that implies. The Mormon Church, if it had its way, wouldn't even want to see gay couples have hospital visitation rights. It's not just about marriage--for them, it's about making gays into second-class citizens. Even hospital rights are a "concession" that have to be made to prevent full marriage equality.
The Bay Area Reporter has learned that the campaign did shoot a commercial featuring a lesbian discussing why separate is not equal, but that never aired.
Kate Kendell and Geoff Kors, members of the No on 8 executive committee, confirmed during an interview Monday, November 10 that such an ad was made and that it was not shown on television because the campaign had to counter the Yes on 8 ads that said children would be taught about same-sex marriage in schools.More about the ad that was left on the cutting room floor is below the fold....A No on 8 ad featuring state schools chief Jack O'Connell was hastily put up to fight off the steep drop in internal polls that Kendell said was seen after the Yes on 8 ad with a daughter coming home from school telling her shocked mother that she "can marry a princess" and showing the children's book King and King about a prince who falls in love with a prince.
"We dropped 19 points after that ad, the O'Connell ad brought us back 12 points," Kendell said. "We were closing."
"There was not enough money to do both," she added. "The ad choices were dictated by reality."
The ad, which has not been released by No on 8, highlighted Jeanne Rizzo, one of the parties in the lawsuit that was responsible for overturning the state law barring same-sex marriage.
Rizzo, a registered nurse and executive director of the Breast Cancer Fund, told the B.A.R. Wednesday in a phone interview that she was happy to help the No on 8 campaign by appearing in the ad. She said that the ad was made by Ogilvy Public Relations and taped in her home. In the 30-second spot, she said the core message was: "You've heard domestic partnerships are similar to marriage. I'm here to tell you it's not. My partner and I got married after 20 years together." The ad closed with her saying that she's 62 years old, a nurse, an American, "and I should have the same rights."The BAR editorial does a post mortem on No on 8 that hits the nail on the head, "Focus grouped to a fault." A failure to reach out to the black community. Complacency in the LGBT community that prevented ad buys early on. Ineffective ads. And this:Rizzo said she also participated in a "softer interview" that was considered by the campaign but not used.
But other campaign missteps were factors, and one of the biggest was that No on 8 relied heavily on focus groups, ad testing, and internal polls to shape its campaign at the expense of real same-sex couples telling their stories and explaining to voters why marriage is so important.The editorial also notes that Kate Kendall (who will be at the Equality NC conference on Saturday), admitted during the interview referenced above, that the messaging hurt the effort.From the beginning, we believe, a deliberate decision was made to exclude LGBTs from the ad campaign - and let's be honest, TV ads are critical to winning a statewide initiative race. Focus groups, we had been told by campaign executive committee members, consistently showed that test subjects were uncomfortable seeing us in ads. But that finding ignores the fact that this campaign was all about the right of same-sex couples to marry. Couples had been marrying up and down the state since June. People were seeing stories in the media about couples who had married. In other words, we were already out there, yet No on 8 ran a campaign that shoved us back in the closet and did nothing to make voters more comfortable with us.
The central message of No on 8 was problematic: "No matter how you feel about marriage, vote against discrimination." This phrase excuses people for their own bigotry. It says, "It's okay not to like us, you just don't have to discriminate against us." It lets people off the hook emotionally and says to people that we're okay with it if they don't like us, when truthfully we are not. And when you let people off the hook emotionally, you don't get them back, no matter how rational and logical you are. Emotional permission overcomes rationality. And the No on 8 campaign gave people permission to vote yes.
[S]he told us that after the Prop 22 fight eight years ago, she expressed that she never wanted to be involved again in a campaign that didn't ask for a straight up or down vote on same-sex marriage. But that's what happened with No on 8. It was only in the waning days of the campaign that a hard-hitting ad went up on TV that 1) addressed past discrimination in California; 2) explained why it was wrong; and 3) showed images of gays and lesbians. Imagine what the result might have been if that ad had run for several weeks instead of just a few days.
What the late LDS leader Gordon Hinckley knew at the time was that he needed to hook up a church with a better rep (ha!) to front for it - the Catholic church. Here is a report on the strategy memo:
In the above report, the church doesn't question the memo's validity, in fact, the sources said there are other related documents that could surface. One snippet of the LDS memo underscores the level of hate the church has for gays (HLM refers to "homosexual legal marriage"):
50-State Join the Impact!Please note especially the last paragraph. "There may have to be certain legal rights recognized for unmarried people..." Take a look at what that implies. The Mormon Church, if it had its way, wouldn't even want to see gay couples have hospital visitation rights. It's not just about marriage--for them, it's about making gays into second-class citizens. Even hospital rights are a "concession" that have to be made to prevent full marriage equality.
The Bay Area Reporter has learned that the campaign did shoot a commercial featuring a lesbian discussing why separate is not equal, but that never aired.
Kate Kendell and Geoff Kors, members of the No on 8 executive committee, confirmed during an interview Monday, November 10 that such an ad was made and that it was not shown on television because the campaign had to counter the Yes on 8 ads that said children would be taught about same-sex marriage in schools.More about the ad that was left on the cutting room floor is below the fold....A No on 8 ad featuring state schools chief Jack O'Connell was hastily put up to fight off the steep drop in internal polls that Kendell said was seen after the Yes on 8 ad with a daughter coming home from school telling her shocked mother that she "can marry a princess" and showing the children's book King and King about a prince who falls in love with a prince.
"We dropped 19 points after that ad, the O'Connell ad brought us back 12 points," Kendell said. "We were closing."
"There was not enough money to do both," she added. "The ad choices were dictated by reality."
The ad, which has not been released by No on 8, highlighted Jeanne Rizzo, one of the parties in the lawsuit that was responsible for overturning the state law barring same-sex marriage.
Rizzo, a registered nurse and executive director of the Breast Cancer Fund, told the B.A.R. Wednesday in a phone interview that she was happy to help the No on 8 campaign by appearing in the ad. She said that the ad was made by Ogilvy Public Relations and taped in her home. In the 30-second spot, she said the core message was: "You've heard domestic partnerships are similar to marriage. I'm here to tell you it's not. My partner and I got married after 20 years together." The ad closed with her saying that she's 62 years old, a nurse, an American, "and I should have the same rights."The BAR editorial does a post mortem on No on 8 that hits the nail on the head, "Focus grouped to a fault." A failure to reach out to the black community. Complacency in the LGBT community that prevented ad buys early on. Ineffective ads. And this:Rizzo said she also participated in a "softer interview" that was considered by the campaign but not used.
But other campaign missteps were factors, and one of the biggest was that No on 8 relied heavily on focus groups, ad testing, and internal polls to shape its campaign at the expense of real same-sex couples telling their stories and explaining to voters why marriage is so important.The editorial also notes that Kate Kendall (who will be at the Equality NC conference on Saturday), admitted during the interview referenced above, that the messaging hurt the effort.From the beginning, we believe, a deliberate decision was made to exclude LGBTs from the ad campaign - and let's be honest, TV ads are critical to winning a statewide initiative race. Focus groups, we had been told by campaign executive committee members, consistently showed that test subjects were uncomfortable seeing us in ads. But that finding ignores the fact that this campaign was all about the right of same-sex couples to marry. Couples had been marrying up and down the state since June. People were seeing stories in the media about couples who had married. In other words, we were already out there, yet No on 8 ran a campaign that shoved us back in the closet and did nothing to make voters more comfortable with us.
The central message of No on 8 was problematic: "No matter how you feel about marriage, vote against discrimination." This phrase excuses people for their own bigotry. It says, "It's okay not to like us, you just don't have to discriminate against us." It lets people off the hook emotionally and says to people that we're okay with it if they don't like us, when truthfully we are not. And when you let people off the hook emotionally, you don't get them back, no matter how rational and logical you are. Emotional permission overcomes rationality. And the No on 8 campaign gave people permission to vote yes.
[S]he told us that after the Prop 22 fight eight years ago, she expressed that she never wanted to be involved again in a campaign that didn't ask for a straight up or down vote on same-sex marriage. But that's what happened with No on 8. It was only in the waning days of the campaign that a hard-hitting ad went up on TV that 1) addressed past discrimination in California; 2) explained why it was wrong; and 3) showed images of gays and lesbians. Imagine what the result might have been if that ad had run for several weeks instead of just a few days.
We're not sure of the numbers yet, but between 5K-15K turned out in NYC yesterday to peacefully march and exercising their First Amendment rights to express their opinion of the Church of Latter Day Saints' involvement in the passage of Prop 8 in California, and to show unity and support for the right of gay and lesbian couples to marry. Video from Andres Duque of Blabbeando:
He has a ton of photos here.
Joe Jervis of Joe.My.God has great coverage, including shots of organizer Corey Johnson, Mike Signorile, Andy Towle and Whoopi Goldberg.
More coverage:
- 15,000 march against Prop 8 in NYC (Rex Wockner)
- NYC: Thousands rally for equality (Joe.My.God)
- Lavi Soloway's photos here
- NYC against Proposition 8 - aka Prop Hate (Pop Bytes)
- Thousands protest Prop 8 in Manhattan (Boy in Bushwick)
- More video, by Father Tony over at The Bilerico Project.
The 50-state protest on Saturday: www.jointheimpact.com
North Carolina will be turning out - Raleigh, Charlotte, Greensboro (who else?) - to march on Saturday at 1:30 PM. I will be on WUNC's "The State of Things" on Friday at noon (hopefully at least my voice has recovered) with Raleigh organizer Will Elliott to talk about the march -- and the EqualityNC conference that is occurring on the same day. Truth be told, I want to clone myself so I can march and attend the conference - my marriage is one that isn't recognized where I live, my state is the last state in the South that has not passed a marriage amendment due to our allies in the General Assembly.
The debate on mailing lists, Facebook, etc. about the Raleigh rally is whether it is more important to attend the march or the conference. Well, IMHO, the problem is that they are both important. We need a huge public show of support for equality here in NC, because the LGBT community here is not as large as L.A. or N.Y., and it's generally invisible to legislators.
Once the rally disbands, we need those energized to lobby those legislators to fight off the influence of the fundie descent into our state to try to get an amendment on the ballot. Our organized movement (via the conference) here needs to harness the grassroots energy activated by the protest. Both need to succeed; we don't need a feeble turnout at either.
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