Are thousands of Oregonians invisible?

I was so proud to be an Oregonian on Sunday night when I watched more than 4,000 of my neighbors walk across the Hawthorne Bridge hand-in-hand to show support for a gay couple that had been brutally attacked on that very spot a week earlier—simply because they were holding hands.¹

As KATU’s Tim Gordon noted, "It was an amazing turnout for an event that was publicized just 72 hours ago with a single Facebook page."2

However, our state’s largest media outlet, The Oregonian, failed to cover the rally at all. This is the same paper that reported on a 15-person Tea Party protest in Portland!³

Tell The Oregonian’s publisher: We are not invisible! It is unfair to cover Tea Party rallies, but ignore 4,000 Oregonians holding hands against hate.

Unfortunately, giving short shrift to progressives has become increasingly common in the year and a half since N. Christian Anderson III became The Oregonian’s new publisher.

As our friends at Our Oregon have noted, "First, the paper famously flipped its opinion on ballot measures 66 and 67 after its new publisher took over, then opened up its front page to advertising (reversing their previous decision) by opponents to the measures, and has since tried to censor political advertisements from the Portland Schools’ Bond campaign that Anderson also doesn't agree with."⁴

Sign our petition demanding that The Oregonian’s publisher apologize for this unfair treatment and outline a plan to provide REAL “fair and balanced” news coverage in the future.

Noah Heller
Progressive Oregon

P.S. Please add your name by our midnight deadline on Sunday so that we can deliver our petition to The Oregonian’s publisher early next week!

Sources:

1.“Thousands Hold Hands Across Hawthorne Bridge to Protest Anti-LGBT Violence,” Just Out, May 30, 2011
http://blogout.justout.com/?p=33830

2. “Thousands rally at Hands Across Hawthorne,” KATU, May 30, 2011
http://portlandcitycenter.katu.com/news/community-spirit/thousands-rally-hands-across-hawthorne/440801

3. “Tea Party Protest in Portland,” The Oregonian, October 25, 2010
http://videos.oregonlive.com/oregonian/2010/04/tea_party_protest_in_portland.html

4. “Is Oregon Capitol News an “Independent” News Outlet?,” Our Oregon, May 9, 2011
http://ouroregon.org/sockeye/blog/oregon-capitol-news-independent-news-outlet

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Showing 6 reactions

Peter Bhatia commented 2011-06-04 20:59:20 -0400 · Flag

Noah: This is from Peter Bhatia, editor of The Oregonian. I’ve read your post on this site about last Sunday’s event and felt I should set the record straight. It was a mistake on the part of staffers in charge of weekend coverage that there was not coverage of the rally in The Oregonian. It was human error, pure and simple. We should have covered the event. Please be clear: There is no ideology involved in our coverage decisions, from the left or the right. Suggestions that The Oregonian has moved rightward in its coverage is nonsense, just as are the more common assertions from the right that we have a left bias. News coverage decisions are made by the newsroom. In this case, we made a bad one.

@ChargerJeff tweeted link to this page. 2011-06-04 15:33:34 -0400

#orcot RT @OregonTeaParty: @ProgressiveOregon absurdly claims that @Oregonian carries the water for @OregonTeaParty http://fb.me/RJYAdbmV

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@OregonTeaParty tweeted link to this page. 2011-06-04 15:23:34 -0400

@ProgressiveOregon absurdly claims that the @Oregonian carries the water for @OregonTeaParty and has a right wing... http://fb.me/RJYAdbmV

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Albert Kaufman commented 2011-06-02 11:14:27 -0400 · Flag

Environmentalists are also not on their radar. The paper seems to be in a permanent haze about who actually lives here. Publisher, go back to Orange County, ASAP!

Albert Kaufman commented 2011-06-02 11:14:26 -0400 · Flag

Lots of invisible constituencies when it comes to the Oregonian. Anyone who cares about the environment. It’s a libertarian rag.

@qcenter tweeted link to this page. 2011-06-01 19:04:23 -0400

We made national news all week...but nothing from The Oregonian. Are thousands of Oregonians invisible???... http://fb.me/YrFpzF6l

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