Here are your choice s: flay, frown, fume or feel any number of positive emotions about Time Magazine's covers, but don't make decisions based on them.
Time Magazine Gay Marriage issue by Time
Take for example,
this week's dual-covers of the Time, flaunting
two men and two women kissing with a headline "Gay Marriage Already Won." Knowing how millions of opponents of same-sex
marriage might react to such images, Time's
Managing Editor, Rick Stengel, preemptively coaxed them towards a decision by
writing this in the Politico's Playbook , "Some
thought they were sensationalist and too in-your-face. Others felt the images
were beautiful and symbolized the love that is at the heart of the idea of
marriage. I agree with the latter, and I hope you do too."
You sure don't believe in subtlety Mr.
Stengel, do you?
And then came Time's full story by David von Drehle, touting a "seismic
social shift" in American public opinion, effectively selling the idea
that same sex marriage is here to stay.
That may be the case. But this seismic
social shift lie along the American family's fault lines, so decide carefully,
just like the Supreme Court. Don't let a fleeting, sensational image sway you.
The Time
is challenging an institution that has time on its side; well over two thousand
years and counting. On the contrary, Time's
verdict, particularly around social issues, inverts well within a lifetime.
It was the same Time Magazine cover which was predicting
a "growing movement to strengthen marriage..." in 1995. By 2000, it shifted to "Who needs a husband?" And by 2010, the question became "Who needs marriage?"
Anytime Time uses the word "marriage" in its cover, I know the
idea will be divorced in a few years.
It was one thing if Time Magazine covers had only vacillated
over the issue of marriage; but that's not the case.
In 2005, Time's cover was tempting to many: "Why we're going gaga over real estate" . Within a year, the housing market peaked.
Come 2010, and the cover read " Why owning a home may no longer make economic sense . " What? They flipped on us, long before
we could flip over those overpriced properties.
In 2004, Time encouraged well-educated moms to stay-at-home
by sharing, "Why more young moms are opting out
of the rat race." I
am sure women who quit the "rat race" back then didn't feel appreciated
when they were instructed by the same magazine's cover this month to not "... hate (Facebook's Cheryl
Sandberg) because she is successful."
And who can
forget the 1966 bombshell cover asking, "Is God Dead?" Anyone who allowed that cover story to hurt
their faith must have ached to discover in 2009 as to "How faith can heal."
Finding a
spouse, buying a house, pursuing a career, or believing in God are life
changing decisions. Decisions which cannot be relegated to the shifting sands
of weekly magazine covers.
With only 3.4%
of Americans identifying themselves as LGBT (and a fraction of
them interested in tying the knot) don't expect the stigma associated with
same-sex marriages to fizzle out anytime soon. With less than 15
out of the 242 countries in the world recognizing same-sex marriages and many
US states banning them, this fight won't end even with a favorable Supreme Court
decision.
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