Miss California vs Perez Hilton
Have you been following the fallout from the Miss USA 2009 pageant? Miss California, Carrie Prejean, got the hot question of the night about gay marriage. She answered: "I think it's great Americans are able to choose one or the other. We live in a land that you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage. And you know what in my country, in my family I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody there, but that's how I was raised and that's how I think it should be, between a man and a woman."
Perez Hilton is the judge who asked the question. Later, ABCnews.com reported: In a video blog posted Sunday night, he called Prejean "a dumb b----." He later apologized in the blog, offering to take Prejean out for coffee and a "talk."
Here's where it gets interesting to me. Perez Hilton, again from ABCNews.com: "I was floored. I haven't said this before, but to her credit, I applaud her for her honesty. However, she is not a politician, she's a hopeful Miss USA. Miss USA should represent everyone. Her answer alienated millions of gay and lesbian Americans, their families and their supporters."
The Hilton argument is all wrong. It's precisely that she ISN'T a politician that she needed to answer fully and truthfully, based on her beliefs, which she apparently did. It's the politicians who answer questions as the situation deems necessary. Thus the phrase "politically correct."
And look at us (Americans in general). We at once loathe tabloid "journalism" and reward it by putting the current king of the practice on a worldwide stage by making him a judge of this contest. (Perez Hilton is a writer/blogger concentrating on celebrity gossip and photos; think tabloid trash on the web. Hilton's real name is Mario Lavandeira.)
I pose this question: If a Miss USA contestant answered the same question in the opposite, would he have chastised her as severely for alienating millions more who oppose same-sex marriage?
Perez Hilton is the judge who asked the question. Later, ABCnews.com reported: In a video blog posted Sunday night, he called Prejean "a dumb b----." He later apologized in the blog, offering to take Prejean out for coffee and a "talk."
Here's where it gets interesting to me. Perez Hilton, again from ABCNews.com: "I was floored. I haven't said this before, but to her credit, I applaud her for her honesty. However, she is not a politician, she's a hopeful Miss USA. Miss USA should represent everyone. Her answer alienated millions of gay and lesbian Americans, their families and their supporters."
The Hilton argument is all wrong. It's precisely that she ISN'T a politician that she needed to answer fully and truthfully, based on her beliefs, which she apparently did. It's the politicians who answer questions as the situation deems necessary. Thus the phrase "politically correct."
And look at us (Americans in general). We at once loathe tabloid "journalism" and reward it by putting the current king of the practice on a worldwide stage by making him a judge of this contest. (Perez Hilton is a writer/blogger concentrating on celebrity gossip and photos; think tabloid trash on the web. Hilton's real name is Mario Lavandeira.)
I pose this question: If a Miss USA contestant answered the same question in the opposite, would he have chastised her as severely for alienating millions more who oppose same-sex marriage?
