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02/24/2010

Pulling Focus: NCAA sports principled ad policy

by Jeremy Hooper

Screen Shot 2010-02-25 At 9.51.02 Am-1Why paying attention to these things matters:

"Focus on the Family did have a banner ad on NCAA.com. Today, it was decided to remove the ad from the website as a result of concerns expressed by our membership," Bob Williams, an NCAA spokesman, said via e-mail late Tuesday.
Family Values and the NCAA [Inside Higher Ed]

A smart, "gay cure"-rejecting decision. The NCAA might be focused on college sports. But it's nice to know they're at least somewhat focused on the science classroom as well.

**The backstory: Weird, why doesn't Focus ever address 'the homosexual problem' in their actual ads? [G-A-Y]

***

**UPDATE: The AP has more:

The NCAA made the decision after some of its members - including faculty and athletic directors - expressed concern that the evangelical group's stance against gay and lesbian relationships conflicted with the NCAA's policy of inclusion regardless of sexual orientation, Williams said.
...
Focus on the Family spokesman Gary Schneeberger said that if such material were "all of a sudden labeled hate speech, we have deeper problems in our country than we even know."

Williams said the decision to pull the ad was based not on the message but on the messenger.

Advertisers "should be generally supportive of NCAA values and attributes and/or not be in conflict with the NCAA's mission and fundamental principles," according to NCAA standards. The NCAA may exclude ads or advertisers "that do not appear to be in the best interests of higher education and student athletes."
NCAA yanks Focus on the Family ad amid concerns [AP via Forbes]

Oh, Gary. We thought you'd at least wait a breath before jumping to disingenuous "hate speech" claims!

The truth is that corporations have EVERY RIGHT to make decisions about things like advertising, and it has NOTHING to do with free speech! it has to do with policies that align with an organizational mission. And it seems, Gary, that people are looking a little more closely and finding that they do not, in fact, want to refer to gay human as "a person with a homosexual problem," or to see that person's "cure."

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Your thoughts

Here's a little more information. It was public pushback that made the difference:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/24/AR2010022403360.html

Posted by: Jon F | Feb 24, 2010 4:32:30 PM

Thx, Jon. Of course Gary immediately jumps to "hate speech" canards. Eventhough he knows full well that organizations have every right to choose ads that align with their mission.

I have had it up to the proverbial here with their deceitful misreps.

Posted by: G-A-Y | Feb 24, 2010 5:02:12 PM

How pleasant it is to start the day with some good news for a change. Thank you NCAA for doing the right thing, and thank you G-A-Y for doing the hard work of keeping an eye on the bigots at FOF.

Posted by: Derek | Feb 25, 2010 9:54:31 AM

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