Gay Today: World

New York Times Magazine
Editors Admit Error

Compiled by GayToday

New York, New York—Bringing a happy ending to a contentious dispute in which GayToday became shamelessly engaged, The New York Times Magazine admitted, finally, in its July 2 issue, to having made (in its May 28 issue) an “editing error.”

The dispute had erupted when the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) objected, as did GayToday, to questionable reportage that gave readers the impression that SLDN, an effective activist organization, had asked Calpernia Addams, a pre-operative transsexual, to twist facts about her gender identity in order to suit its own gay agenda.

Murdered Pfc. Barry Winchell was the subject of a New York Times Magazine article a gay group labeled homophobic

Ms. Addams, however, denied having told David France, the New York Times Magazine writer, that she'd been asked by SLDN officials to self-identify as a male. This, the Times article had implied, would have been required in order to effectively dramatize and politicize the murder of her lover, Pfc. Barry Winchell, turning it thereby more recognizably into a gay bias case.

In fact, Ms. Addams had been quoted in an earlier interview in which she'd explained that she'd reached the decision to call herself a man entirely on her own.

GayToday's editor, Jack Nichols, had called the slant of the Times story a "deliberate attempt to trash SLDN." David France, who has since reportedly been hired as an editor at Newsweek, responded angrily to Nichols, defending the veracity of his reportage. Nichols, however, maintained that his criticisms had been aimed specifically at the magazine's neo-conservative editorial department, not at the writer of the article.

Related Stories from the GayToday Archive:
New York Times Magazine Prints Blatant Falsehoods

NY Times Magazine Writer Blasts GayToday's Editor

The New York Times: All the News that's Gay to Print

Related Sites:
Servicemembers Legal Defense Network

GayToday does not endorse related sites.

And, in the July 2nd issue's selection of Letters, Page 8, The New York Times Magazine printed the following admission of error:

CORRECTION:

Because of an editing error, an article on May 28 about Calpernia Addams, who is in the process of changing sexes to female from male, and the murder of her boyfriend, Pfc. Barry Winchell, included an erroneous statement about a meeting between Addams and Kathi Westcott, a lawyer, and Rhonda White, a gay rights advocate, after the murder. Westcott did not say that Addams, "for the sake of clarity" should tell reporters to refer to her as a male. White and Westcott discussed the press with Addams but did not make a specific proposal about how the press should refer to her.

The New York Times Magazine, July 2, Letters