What 'The New York Times' Isn't Telling You

Now is an important time to listen to the queer activists from the AIDS Crisis. So why isn't the paper of record?

Photos: Leandro Justen via Reclaim Pride.

In June of 2019, Natalie James looked out at the scene of the Great Lawn in Central Park—one that she, the co-founder of the Reclaim Pride Coalition, helped to set. While the World Pride Festivities took place far downtown, accompanied by the glittering floats of corporate sponsors ranging from Pepsi to Bank of America, James and her cohort created a movement that more closely mimicked the activistic origins of the LGBTQ+ Rights Movement. After all, New York was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, an uprising against the police department that would spawn decades of organizing to get ourselves ever closer to the finish line of equality. 

Reclaim Pride was, in essence, doing exactly as its name suggested. Without police participation or corporate floats, organizers and volunteers marched the same route their queer forebearers did nearly 50 years prior, starting from the Stonewall Inn and ending up, some 50 blocks later, in the middle of Central Park. James witnessed 45,000 people come together to honor what she felt Pride was really about: protest. I remember stepping onto that lawn, following Lady Bunny’s coattails, and navigating my way towards the stage, where activists were giving moving, candid speeches to shouts and cheers from a multi-generational audience. When it started raining heavily, all of us in the crowd ran for shelter under the large trees at the perimeter of the lawn. Olympia Perez, the speaker of the moment, was utterly unfazed. She looked up at the sky, her arms outstretched to the souls of the trans women of color who launched the movement: “Marsha, rain on us! Sylvia, rain on us!” she screamed. We all smiled as the warm rain hit our foreheads. 

Less than one year later, James came back to the Great Lawn to observe a very different sight in a remarkably different city. Smack in the middle of the grass—where we once gathered in our rainbow finest and chanted choice words for the NYPD—were stark white tents containing medical equipment and hospital beds. Emblazoned on their sides was an image of a cross accompanied by the name “Samaritan’s Purse.” The scene may have contrasted the community and celebration of the year prior, but the reason James was there in the first place was pretty much exactly the same: She was protesting on behalf of LGBTQ+ people. 

Samaritan’s Purse first erected the big white tents  in New York City’s Central Park at the end of March, then began treating patients on April 1st for Mount Sinai Health System. The organization was once referred to in an article by The Guardian as an example of a “fundamentalist American evangelical Christian missionaries.” In the piece, the writer details a campaign called “Operation Christmas Child,” which Samaritan’s Purse claims has provided Christmas gifts to “157 million children in 160 countries.” Of course, there was a catch: The children come from predominantly Muslim nations, meaning they very likely do not celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. Regardless, Samaritan’s Purse mails them a shoebox “filled with presents” and...a missionary book of Bible stories. It’s charity, but with a major catch—in order to receive their good will, you must also receive the “good word.” To boot: When earthquakes struck El Salvador in 2001, villagers whose homes were destroyed were required to attend a half-hour prayer meeting before they could receive aid from the organization, which was there on behalf of the American government. After all: What’s aid work without good old fashioned colonization, anyway?

Samaritan’s Purse is run by Reverend Franklin Graham, the son of the late, infamous Billy Graham, an American televangelist who captivated the attention of millions of Americans and, consequently, helped build the voting bloc we now know as “the religious right” in the ‘60s and ‘70s. The elder Graham believed “the world [was] attacking Christians because they hate the name of Christ,” and mobilized his followers to vote in droves for conservative Republicans at the polls. When he backed Donald Trump for President in 2016, his audience listened and similarly sprung into action. CNN reports that, “Trump won white born-again evangelicals with more than 75% of the vote in 2016 and his approval rating with them remains at 75% in polling taken in the middle of last year.”

The elder Graham also held some other choice beliefs, notably that homosexuality was a “sinister form of perversion” that “leads to death.” In 1993, in the midst of the AIDS crisis, he asked a crowd: “Is AIDS a judgment of God? I could not be sure, but I think so.” He apologized two weeks later, but the damage was done. 

Franklin Graham, his son, has carried on his father’s painful and torrid legacy as the current president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritan’s Purse. In 2015, The Charlotte Observer reported that his total compensation in 2014 “was more than $880,000,” with $620,000 of that sum coming directly from Samaritan’s Purse. The younger Graham mirrors many of his father’s beliefs: he once defended Vladimir Putin’s anti-gay laws in Russia, called Islam “evil” and “wicked,” insisted “The Muslim Brotherhood...infiltrated every level of our government” during Barack Obama’s presidency, and said in a since-deleted post that “Satan himself” is “the architect behind” LGBTQ+ rights. As much as I loathe the man, I will hand it to him: That last reference is quite a compelling visual. He must be watching The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, too.

You would be surprised to learn all of this, however, if you read yesterday’s piece about Samaritan’s Purse in The New York Times, written by the two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Sheri Fink. In it, Fink details the coronavirus treatment efforts in “the hot zone” of Central Park made by doctors affiliated with the organization, some of whom treated Ebola in Liberia. In fact, it takes an astounding 21 paragraphs before Fink even mentions Franklin Graham or the controversy that surrounds him at all. Queer people and our oppression were, in effect, relegated to being just a footnote of her piece.

The actions orchestrated by Samaritan’s Purse were both validated and affirmed by Dr. David L. Reich, the president of Mount Sinai Hospital and Mount Sinai Queens, who urged his staff during a meeting to “pray for the tents.” Dr. Reich told Fink that the hospital “was considered an extension of Mount Sinai.” His endorsement arrived just one week before The Cathedral of St. John the Divine rejected efforts by Samaritan’s Purse to place 400 beds in their building. Gothamist reports that the Episcopalian faith leaders there called off the project “given how important the cathedral is to many different constituencies, including the LGBTQ community.”  

Immediately after the tents were erected in Central Park, New York state Senator Brad Hoylman issued a warning to Franklin Graham, the City of New York, and Mount Sinai hospital. “It’s unacceptable that a New Yorker diagnosed with COVID-19 could be subjected to discriminatory treatment from an organization whose leaders call us ‘immoral’ and ‘detestable,’” he said in a statement. 

For those wondering what possible harm could be caused by anyone offering medical assistance during a pandemic, consider this: Each volunteer with Samaritan’s Purse must sign a Statement of Faith. In the document, there’s a particularly queerphobic clause that reads, “We believe...that God created man and woman as unique biological persons made to complete each other….we believe that marriage is exclusively the union of one genetic male and one genetic female.”

In other words, the people working in the tents have signed a contract (with God, presumably) declaring that they do not believe in marriage equality and, ostensibly, that trans people’s identities are valid. They were then rewarded by the City of New York and Mount Sinai, who affirmed and validated their operation by asking them to sign a paper saying they promised not to discriminate against their potential patients. The officials failed to realize, of course, that by signing this Statement of Faith, the doctors already had stated discriminatory beliefs. Many on the right like to say they are not homophobic, they just believe marriage is between a man and a woman. Or, they say, they don’t care if you’re trans, just only use the bathroom that corresponds with your assigned gender identity. This, of course, is a false equivalence: Denying equality is discrimination, plain and simple.

The operation in Central Park is even more pernicious when you take into account the fact that LGBTQ+ people already face a host of barriers while accessing healthcare. All in all, 37 states do not expressly ban health insurance discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. In a Human Rights Watch Report, queer and trans people interviewed by the organization reported difficulty finding hormoone replacement therapy, HIV prevention or treatment, and more revealingly, “welcoming primary care” providers. In some facilities, patients are offered “counseling” or warnings about sexual activity, rather than affirming, non-judgmental medical care. The stigma against HIV/AIDS still manifests itself in many ways, the most notable among them the FDA’s ongoing mandate that gay and bisexual men are deemed unsafe to donate blood. 

Given this context, LGBTQ+ activists organized accordingly. James reached out to fellow queer activists following the arrest of Reverend Billy on April 4th for demonstrating in Central Park and formed the RPC COVID-19 Response Working Group. She was joined by members of both Rise and Resist and ACT UP to declare a list of demands. High on their list was that Samaritan’s Purse “drop its requirement that volunteers and employees agree to its transphobic and homophobic ‘Statement of Faith.’” To apply pressure, activists appeared in Central Park, appropriately distant from one another and wearing protective masks, holding signs that read “Let Queers Help NYC,” “NYC Rejects Hate,” and “Do No Harm.” Included in their press conference was the account of a man named Timothy Lunceford-Stevens, who claims he was rejected as a volunteer at Samaritan’s Purse in Central Park because he refused to sign the document. At least one other volunteer, James Finn, had a similar account, which he posted on Medium. 

Nonetheless, late on Tuesday, Mount Sinai offered a solution, apparently prompted by the Mayor’s office: They told state officials that they would require all workers in the tents to “sign a pledge vowing not to discriminate against patients.”  

When I asked Senator Hoylman about the matter, he said that “it's [the] government's responsibility to ensure [Graham] follows our civil rights laws.” However, he acknowledged that requiring oversight of such delicate matters in the midst of a pandemic might not be the highest  priority for officials: “It’s only as effective as the overseers…I honestly can’t say that it’ll happen,” he concedes. “It’s truly a shame New York has given a platform to this bigot and inadvertently helped legitimize his hatefulness.” 

James—and Reclaim Pride more broadly—happen to agree. “We want to hold the city accountable for approving of this group’s coming to New York City, and demand that they be transparent in how they will be monitored for discrimination and quality of care,” she says. “The New York City Human Rights Commission should investigate Samaritan’s Purse to see whether there were violations of city or state law which protects from discrimination against specific categories of people, including on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, or religious beliefs.” 

James says she sent Reclaim Pride’s press release to the Times, but they were only nominally mentioned in an article detailing how Franklin Graham was being “harassed.” Their in-person demonstration was not mentioned in Fink’s coverage, either, despite the fact that protesters were visible just outside the tents. 

Fink’s piece drew swift outrage from LGBTQ+ people (myself included) on Twitter early Wednesday morning. What I wanted to tweet, but didn’t, was a simple “What the fuck?” An evangelical Christian who has made numerous homophobic and Islamophobic statements comes to New York and props up a tent, and what he gets in return is rosy coverage from our paper of record. Graham, perhaps as media savvy as his father, even used Central Park as his backdrop for a televised Easter Sunday service, which James points out, was surely a significant fundraising event for his company. Meanwhile, Mount Sinai, Mayor Bill de Blasio, and Governor Andrew Cuomo have allowed him to do as he pleases—despite the fact that his values fly in the face of what we New Yorkers like to think of ourselves.

I was still outraged, incensed even, when I finally reached Alexis Danzig, an alumnus of ACT UP, over the phone. Danzig was also outraged, but she (predictably) knew better than I did—she was not surprised. At the height of ACT UP’s activism, she notes, many organizers considered The New York Times the “enemy.” “They are the gatekeeper and the power broker,” Danzig says. In fact, she asks, “How have they been writing our name for a million fucking years?” As of 2019, it was still spelled “Act Up,” while their name is an acronym that stands for: AIDS COALITION TO UNLEASH POWER. Therefore, just like WHO or FDA, all capitals would be appropriate. 

The relationship between The Times and ACT UP is even more fraught—and, to be frank, could probably be its own essay, ideally written by someone with more expertise on the matter than me. However, it’s important even to paraphrase just how badly The Times fumbled its coverage of HIV/AIDS and, by proxy, the activist group that would eventually go on to forever change how pharmaceutical companies bring drugs to market, and the politics of LGBTQ+ liberation. In 2017, Larry Kramer denouncedThe Times as being too slow to report on AIDS; in 1981, they covered instances of the virus as a ‘rare cancer seen in homosexuals’; one article from 1990 finally conceded, calling ACT UP “effective,” but then made sure to include a mention of the “carnival” element to their weekly meetings, citing the scandal of “three women in pants,” “a man in a skirt,” and “a transvestite named Rollerena...in ostentatious attendance.” More recently, Yale epidemiologist and ACT UP alum Gregg Gonsalves criticized the headline of a Times piece entitled “Trump Suggests Lack of Testing Is No Longer a Problem. Governors Disagree.” “There’s no debate on this, why frame it like there is one?” he asked. Political correspondent Jonathan Martin responded, “You’re picking the wrong fight. Move along.”

In fact, Gonsalves was picking the exact right fight. The Times’ unfortunate past with reporting on issues like these is something that Kurt Soller (who is objectively brilliant) explored in 2018 for T, when he interviewed six of the paper’s journalists about their “spotty record” of covering AIDS and gay culture in general. This was a necessary exercise, but reading today’s paper, one might consider it a hollow gesture. Accountability does not lie in merely acknowledging institutional errors—it’s only effective if it then works to apologize for them, solve them, and thus prevent them moving forward. That would require an organized effort among leadership at The Times to analyze all of its reporting through a queer lens, and collaborate with respected community activists or organizations to establish best practices in reporting. 

That would be a perfect world, but the media (as I learned all too well throughout my career), is an imperfect one. For so many, these old wounds from The Times’ coverage still sting—not just for LGBTQ+ people who look at the paper with a critical eye, but particularly for the ACT UP organizers who remember all too well the willful ignorance and derisive commentary of the media institution that could have really helped to (for lack of a better word, don’t hate me!) evangelize their message about the AIDS epidemic. 

Recently, T invited a group of ACT UP alumni for a photo shoot. Danzig says that the day of the photo shoot felt a bit like a high school reunion; it was the first time the old gang was back together for something that wasn’t a funeral or a memorial service. In that way, it was heartwarming and jubilant. In another, it was bittersweet. Even though it may have been decades since everyone in the room joined together in a group action, they joined in formation when Jamie Bauer, an alum who’s now an organizer with Rise and Resist, gave a speech before any photos were taken. Shortly afterwards, the group of veterans erupted in chants of “Fuck the New York Times!” 

Jason Rosenberg @mynameisjro

Today seems like a great opportunity to recirculate this video of @actupny vets chanting “FUCK THE NY TIMES” during a recent @nytimes photoshoot. They poorly reported on AIDS protests and continue to poorly report on COVID protests.

“The Times still has blood on its hands, which it can never wash off, even though it is trying to ‘work through’ its lack of coverage of the AIDS crisis and AIDS activism,” they said. “The Times continues, to this day, to ignore the activism of resistance…[it] does not cover organizing, does not cover resistance campaigns, and it does not cover demonstrations.” 

“The Times does not cover Rise and Resist...just as The Times never covered the vast majority of ACT UP actions,” they went on. “The hypocrisy of The Times continues, celebrating what activists did 30 years ago, while ignoring what activists are doing today.” 

Looking at the final piece, which was just published three days ago, Danzig feels that it casts the movement “in amber.” This is a shame, she points out, because the AIDS Crisis is ongoing. Just like The Times overlooked the historical contributions of ACT UP, it also ignored queer activists fighting against Samaritan’s Purse and Franklin Graham. It’s all too likely that the same atittudes that existed towards queer activists in the ‘80s still prevail. But if you think this is about proper press coverage or margin space, you’re missing the larger point of these direct action groups and their work, both past and present.

The media—especially a publication which is widely considered “the paper of record”—is responsible for bringing attention and validity to movements when they happen, but in covering activistic moments, it also brings perspectives not represented widely in its pages. And, of course, in the case of HIV/AIDS, imagine what could have been done to eradicate stigma if reporters took ACT UP’s messaging and LGBTQ+ lives seriously?

“The entities we count on in a democracy to assail the centers of power were themselves reproducing power and failing real people in a crisis,” Danzig says of her past. She takes a long pause. 

“That has not stopped happening.”