Civics: Legacy Media and Men in Women’s Sports
Predictably, the comment section was disabled at the bottom of the editorial, continuing a trend of censorship on issues the Times knows will spark subscriber blowback. The paper almost always tries to justify the suppression by saying it’s a “sensitive” subject, but that is not the true reason.
What I think the Times’ bosses really want is to preserve what’s been described as the “illusion of consensus.” In short: They want to squash any evidence that their readers disagree with them.
Had the comment section been open, it almost certainly would have been filled with a chorus of subscribers voicing their opposition to the “no” endorsement. They would have pointed out that the Times has never shown any consideration to the biological females affected by trans athletes in their sports, and that the separation is simply a matter of fairness.
But this would make it known that the paper’s readers do not jibe with the agenda the Times is pushing. And the brass, well…the brass can’t have that.
This subscriber censorship is hardly limited to the trans-in-sports debate. Earlier this summer — when the World Cup rocketed patriotism to what felt like a 10-year high — a Times reporter found a handful of Trump detractors to suggest the country had mixed feelings about whether it wanted the U.S. men’s soccer team to succeed. The story was universally blasted on social media, as critics decried a tone-deaf attempt to pooh-pooh said patriotism. But it seemed the Times anticipated such a reaction. No comments allowed.
