Red Letter Day

Thursday, July 03, 2008

Truthiness?

The Omaha Jewish Press ran an adapted version of the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle story on Dave and I.

For the most part it was a straight adaptation, with a few "localizations" to make it more relevant to Omaha readers, but there is one big change that is simply incorrect. In the original article, Dave notes that Israel recognizes same-sex marriages performed abroad (although a same-sex couple can't get married in Israel itself). This is the result of a 2006 Israeli Supreme Court ruling.

The Omaha Jewish Press for some reason stated that Israel doesn't recognize same-sex marriages -- and in addition to this inaccuracy, they actually change the words of Dave's quote to account for this inaccuracy -- they made Dave's quote wrong to match the incorrectness of their changed story!

First the original:

“The state of Israel will recognize gay marriages from other parts of the world. We’re hoping that since Israel would recognize it, should we ever make aliyah,” Greenbaum said. “Because we are not legally married in the United States, that would make aliyah more difficult. After tomorrow, we’ll be seen as a couple.”

They don’t have immediate plans to make any sort of move, but they like the security the marriage provides, in case they choose to make aliyah in the future.


and the "new and unimproved version:

The state of Israel does not currently recognize gay marriages from other parts of the world.
“We’re hoping that since Israel might someday recognize it, should we ever make aliyah,” Greenbaum said. “Because we are not legally married in the United States, that would make aliyah more difficult. After tomorrow, we’ll be seen as a couple.”
They don’t have immediate plans to make any sort of move, but they like the security the marriage provides, in case they choose to make aliyah in the future.


We're contacting the Omaha Jewish Press to get the to the bottom of this story. Hopefully someone just made a mistake, and they will correct it. I don't expect any malice behind this, but it is important for news stories to be accurate, and to accurate quote people. I'll let you know what we find out.

UPDATE (11:05 AM July 3, 2008): The Jewish Press responded to our complaint...as we suspected, it wasn't malice but an honest error where they didn't do enough research before posting the story. The following correction will run in next weeks issue:


Correction
In last week’s Press, there was an error in the story “Kansas gay couple wed in San Francisco,” stating: “The state of Israel does not currently recognize gay marriages from other parts of the world.”
In fact, in November, 2006, Israel’s Supreme Court did rule that the government had to register gay marriages performed outside the country, however, they cannot be performed within Israel. While opponents did introduce a bill in the Knesset to overturn the court’s ruling in December of 2006, there has been no action since, leaving the high court’s ruling to accept gay marriages performed elsewhere still standing.
Dave Greenbaum’s quote in the article by Beth Lipoff, which originally appeared in the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle should have read:
“The state of Israel will recognize gay marriages from other parts of the world. We’re hoping that since Israel would recognize it, should we ever make aliyah,” Greenbaum said. “Because we are not legally married in the United States, that would make aliyah more difficult. After tomorrow, we’ll be seen as a couple.”
The Jewish Press regrets the error.

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