Ed Brayton is a freelance writer and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
This is absolutely hilarious. The American Family Association has a policy at its new outlet, OneNewsNow, never to use the word "gay" but to replace it with "homosexual." And that works absolutely perfectly until they write an article about an athlete whose last name is Gay, as in Tyson Gay, the fastest man on the US Olympic track team. And then you get this:
Tyson Homosexual was a blur in blue, sprinting 100 meters faster than anyone ever has.His time of 9.68 seconds at the U.S. Olympic trials Sunday doesn't count as a world record, because it was run with the help of a too-strong tailwind. Here's what does matter: Homosexual qualified for his first Summer Games team and served notice he's certainly someone to watch in Beijing.
"It means a lot to me," the 25-year-old Homosexual said. "I'm glad my body could do it, because now I know I have it in me."
And it's nice to know that Mr. Homosexual kept on pumping:
Wearing a royal blue uniform with red and white diagonal stripes across the front, along with matching shoes, all in a tribute to 1936 Olympic star Jesse Owens, Homosexual dominated the competition. He started well and pulled out to a comfortable lead by the 40-meter mark.This time, he kept pumping those legs all the way through the finish line, extending his lead. In Saturday's opening heat, Homosexual pulled way up, way too soon, and nearly was caught by the field, before accelerating again and lunging in for fourth place.
But it appears the word replace macro didn't function perfectly; the dreaded G word got through one time:
Gay's race came with the wind blowing at 4.1 meters per second; anything above 2.0 is not allowed for record purposes."I didn't really care what the wind was," Homosexual said.
Still, Homosexual was slapping Dix after the race:
After the race, Homosexual and Dix looked at each other and slapped palms, then hugged.
Good thing they didn't do a terrorist fist tap.
Politics
Comments
That.... is...... for..... real....??
Posted by: Skwee | June 30, 2008 9:58 AM
I knew of a church that would to a word replace for the name of the deceased in a funeral bulletin. That worked well, until they had a funeral for a woman named Mary. The next funeral was for a woman named Edna, so the secretary had all instances of the name Mary repalced with Edna. Next thing the congregation knew they were saying the words of the Apostles' Creed with a whole new meaning: Jesus was born of the Virgin Edna;-)
So Homosexual and Dix "slapped palms?" Gives a whole new meaning to mutual masturbation.
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 9:58 AM
Absolutely classic.
Posted by: Ben Roethlisberger | June 30, 2008 9:58 AM
Could someone let the AFA know that this falls into the category of "too much information"?
Posted by: carlsonjok | June 30, 2008 10:00 AM
That is so gay.
Posted by: kehrsam | June 30, 2008 10:05 AM
They just corrected it, but not before I saved the page.
Posted by: Taz | June 30, 2008 10:05 AM
Um... *why* do they feel the need to use the word "homosexual" in the place of "gay"? Are they trying to reclaim the original meaning of the word? (and if so... good luck with that... let us know how it turns out)
I honestly can't think of a single rationale for doing this search and replace. The word "gay" is at this point universally understood to mean the same as "homosexual" isn't it?
Someone fill me in? I can't think fundie this early in the morning.
Posted by: kodiak | June 30, 2008 10:10 AM
kodiak-Pulled out my Lutheran to Fundie lexicon and got this: Gay infers there's something "happy" about the "choice."
Hope that helps!
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 10:14 AM
@Rev AJB, the best bulletin faux pas I've ever read was when my dyslexic friend had to type up the Apostles' Creed. She accepts the first word that spell check gives her in Word, and didn't have time to have someone else proof the text before the service, which left us reading: "[Jesus Christ], was crucified, died and was curried". It's 5 years later and she's still trying to live that one down...
Posted by: kodiak | June 30, 2008 10:15 AM
kodiak - the theory I've heard is that homosexual, having the word-part "sex" in it is intrinsically more "dirty" to the average fundie mind than "gay", which sounds rather pleasant.
Posted by: lauram | June 30, 2008 10:15 AM
Thanks Rev and lauram, seems really odd to me, but then again most of what the fundies care about seem so divorced from my understanding of Chrsitianity that I should probably stop being suprised.
Posted by: kodiak | June 30, 2008 10:21 AM
What will those Cdesign proponentsists come up with next?
Posted by: Herod the Freemason | June 30, 2008 10:26 AM
Guess I haven't been to Tandoor recently. When did they put Curried Savior on the menu? And is that served in an earthenware pot?
The one that always cracked me up on internship was our church calendar always had the women's "quitling" group. Don't know why that one always brings a smile to my face. Of course the occupational hazard is that I keep getting the same "spam" about bulletin mistakes on a weekly basis;-(
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 10:28 AM
kodiak -
"Homosexual" reinforces the word "sex" - it keeps it all about "teh gay sex" which is where they want it to be rhetorically.
Television has turned the word "gay" (and to a point the word "queer") into a stereotype about men who are very snappy dressers and the type of person you might want coordinating your wedding or redecorating your apartment. Which may not be a very accurate stereotype truthfully, but it's certainly not a scary enough one to keep the fear of the "gay agenda" at a very high level.
Posted by: NonyNony | June 30, 2008 10:29 AM
How scandalous...lol
Posted by: Shawn Wilkinson | June 30, 2008 10:31 AM
Could someone post a link to a screen shot or cached page for this? It's just too funny to let it disappear. :D
Posted by: Wes | June 30, 2008 10:33 AM
NonyNony-So you're saying that homosexual immediately conjures up images of guys in leather with handlebar mustaches who have s&m dungeons in their basements--is that scary enough?
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 10:35 AM
Gay gay gay gay gay. Everywhere, all the time. Especially in poetry...e.g., The Daffodils, by William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850).
I wander'd lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils,
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
...
The waves beside them danced, but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee:--
A poet could not but be gay...
[oops, here's what was meant to be said]
A poet could not but be homosexual
[that's much better]
In such a jocund company!
I gazed, and gazed, but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
...
Posted by: ebina2 | June 30, 2008 10:42 AM
I wonder if their entertainment pieces talk about Gilmore Girls star Marcia Homosexual Harden. And if they take ads for the medicinal cream Ben-Homosexual. And mention the R&B legend Marvin Homosexuale. And discuss the historical significance of the atomic bomb dropped by the Enola Homosexual.
Posted by: Tulse | June 30, 2008 10:46 AM
ebina2:
Shouldn't the last couplet line be re-written as:
[/jk]
Posted by: Umlud | June 30, 2008 10:46 AM
Oh, puleeeze, someone upload a copy of that page! It's a classic by the sound of it.
Posted by: Stephen Llewellyn | June 30, 2008 10:59 AM
And discuss the historical significance of the atomic bomb dropped by the Enola Homosexual.
Actual, really LOL. Who'd a thunk that Teh Gay Agenda started that long ago, and involved blowing up cities?
Posted by: Coragyps | June 30, 2008 11:09 AM
Jesus was born of the Virgin Edna and was crucified, died, and curried. I love it! So when the women came to Jesus's tomb anoint the body with spices, I guess they found him already spicy enough, huh? So does the Risen Christ give off a strong aroma reminiscent of an Indian restaurant?
Posted by: Adrienne | June 30, 2008 11:27 AM
Guess so...and it sounds like I need to switch my communion wafers to naan.
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 11:30 AM
That's priceless.
Posted by: Steve Sutton | June 30, 2008 11:39 AM
I guess the war on Christmas is much older than we thought. For how long now have we been urged to "Don we now our homosexual apparel"? By the way, I have a cached version of the page but no where to upload it. If someone does, and wants to give an email address, I'll send it to them.
Posted by: Taz | June 30, 2008 11:40 AM
Ya, at the toast for graduating ministry students at my friend's college they had a whole list of "the Bible according to..." from her essays. The other favorite? At the sermon on the mount Jesus gave massages to the people (what, you thought it was messages? HA! we're talking *full service* services here... wink wink nudge nudge...)
Her sister and I have a plan at the first communion she gives to try and get her elders to switch the bread with curry flavoured potato chips... (ok, they'll never go for it, communion being a sacrament and all... but it'd be AWESOME!)
Posted by: kodiak | June 30, 2008 11:40 AM
Kodiak-being Lutheran the running joke has always been that Luther fully intended the sacrament to be beer and chips;-)
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 11:43 AM
My favourite line: "Homosexual was slapping Dix after the race". Sounds very kinky!
Posted by: Brian Larnder | June 30, 2008 11:46 AM
So instead of "Gay Paree", it is "Homosexual Paree".
Posted by: Janine | June 30, 2008 11:47 AM
Just think, in less than six months they can:
"...Don we now our homosexual apparel
Fa la la la ..."
Lavender and teal are just sooooo much better than red and green.
Posted by: natural cynic | June 30, 2008 11:47 AM
Wow. I'm reminded strong of the Good Old Days when PC was new, and my campus newpaper was reporting stolen items like African American cars, or African American backpacks, or African American bikes.
Good times, good times ;)
Posted by: yttrai | June 30, 2008 11:59 AM
From the original:
"I'm sore right now,'' Homosexual said, "but probably from the victory lap."
I lost my Corn Flakes on that one.
Posted by: Doug | June 30, 2008 12:06 PM
Others have already given what is probably the accurate answer but another possible reason is that "gay" usually denotes "male" in some circles (not always and I know several lesbians that almost exclusively refer to themselves as gay). It has been my experience (YMMV) that those that are anti- homosexual tend to refer to male homosexuality far more than female homosxuality. To me this has always indicated an "ick" factor to their reasoning as well as a dismissive attitude towards what women do so long as they keep the house clean and have dinner on the table by 7pm.
Posted by: Jeremy | June 30, 2008 12:41 PM
Man, if communion wafers were naan, I'd go to church more often. Best bread in the world.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | June 30, 2008 12:41 PM
I believe one of the massages was "blessed are the cheesemakers".
Posted by: noncarborundum | June 30, 2008 12:50 PM
Bump. Terrorist fist BUMP.
Posted by: Rob | June 30, 2008 12:56 PM
Posted by: noncarborundum | June 30, 2008 1:04 PM
Well, they figured it out and it's been change. That's better than Freedom Fries or Homicide Bombers.
Posted by: soboco | June 30, 2008 1:30 PM
Looks like they fixed it.
Shades of this oldie:
http://www.collinson.fr/Jokepage/actor.html
Posted by: Julie Stahlhut | June 30, 2008 1:33 PM
Or the company that turned it around and was now "back in the African-American"
http://tafkac.org/language/back_in_the_african_american.html
[add to yttrai]
Posted by: j a higginbotham | June 30, 2008 1:46 PM
In the words of Peter Griffin: "Freakin' sweet!"
Posted by: Phil | June 30, 2008 1:54 PM
http://i27.tinypic.com/2eauh4z.gif
Be sure to snag a copy of it. I don't know how long pictures stay stored at TinyPic.
Posted by: phil | June 30, 2008 2:22 PM
The people at Right Wing Watch have a screen capture of the "Homosexual" version. They also have a google news search showing that this isn't the first article that OneNewsNow has written about "Tyson Homosexual" - this is just the first one that's been spread around the internet as a laughingstock.
Posted by: Alex | June 30, 2008 2:25 PM
What is the specific problem right-wing nuts like Joey Farah have with the term "gay"?
Is it because they somehow feel the term "normalizes" the idea of same-sex relationships?
That would be my guess...
Posted by: CHV | June 30, 2008 2:40 PM
I wonder if they'll be doing the same thing to "bright" as well.
Posted by: Herod the Freemason | June 30, 2008 3:15 PM
Google cached the article here
Posted by: Decidenator | June 30, 2008 3:41 PM
"Still, Homosexual was slapping Dix after the race"
But he course he was---that's what homosexuals do.
Posted by: Mark | June 30, 2008 3:42 PM
Now I know the truth behind the song by Marvin Homosexuale, "Let's Get It On."
Posted by: soboco | June 30, 2008 3:43 PM
Here's a new twist - OneNewsNow has on its staff a couple of males with feminine names (perhaps they're Metrosexuals?): Jody Brown - OneNewsNow.com Editor-in-Chief, Allie Martin - Reporter/Anchor
But my favorite - and this is not a joke - is this staff members' suggestive name:
Rusty Pugh - Anchor/Reporter
Posted by: R Hampton | June 30, 2008 3:45 PM
From that google cache:
Yeah, well, Mr. Homosexual certainly has been getting quite a bit of action recently, now hasn't he? No wonder he's tired!
Posted by: Adrienne | June 30, 2008 4:43 PM
A rather unattractive girl once accused me of being gay because I was unreceptive to her advances. "You've got me totally wrong", I told her. "I'm just a miserable bastard".
Posted by: Wallace Turner | June 30, 2008 5:07 PM
The Search/Replace comedy is really a hoot! Where, pray tell, were the proofreaders? Or does AFA rely on praying for an ISS* doing it for them?
I enjoyed another hoot this morning while skimming the headlines. Came across a wire story from AP (I'm pretty sure) announcing that "Phelps and Gay" had set new records. Now, if you're like me (doesn't that phrase just turn your stomach?), who springs to mind at the mention of the name Phelps? And he did what with Gay? Set WHAT record?
For the record, swimmer Michael Phelps set a world record in the 400m individual medley, touching the wall in 4:05.25.
Wonder how ol' Fred might have reacted to the news . . .
*Invisible Supernatural Spook
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | June 30, 2008 6:05 PM
They still haven't updated their search
http://www.onenewsnow.com/searchresults.aspx?cx=013271476271883857426%3Awgrzqkzqdwq&cof=FORID%3A11&q=homosexual&sa=Go!#1044
Too bad no one got a capture of the homosexual wins in 9.68 story.
Posted by: j a higginbotham | June 30, 2008 7:21 PM
Priceless!
Crudely Wrott, I'm betting the proofreader is the same "person" as the fact checker: Word 98!
Posted by: Leni | June 30, 2008 8:02 PM
Loved the Phelps and Gay set new records! I'm sure old Fred will have some sort of post about that on his site. Yet another slam against him and yet another reason why America is Doomed (tm).
Couldn't help but think of two of my favorites here in Chicagoland-an anchor named Dick Johnson, and a weatherman named....Pete Sack.
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 8:08 PM
Can tell how much of my life has been spent around horses;-)
Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 30, 2008 8:22 PM
Going through the article and the comments, I can't rmeember laughing this hard in a long, long time! Oh, BTW,I once had an eye doctor whose last name just happened to be Gay. Dr. Homosexual??????
Anne G
Posted by: Anne Gilbert | June 30, 2008 8:39 PM
Or the bass player from the Seekers in the 1960s, Athol Gay. For his sake, I sure hope he didn't have a listhp growing up,
Posted by: kehrsam | June 30, 2008 9:27 PM
There is just too much fun to be had with this one... Yahoo!'s main page last night had a headline about Tyson Gay's wind-aided race. Another headline just below it read "America waiting for next speed queer." Puzzled, I clicked on the link, and saw at the top of the article that the last word should have "queen"--my minimum text size setting in FireFox caused the "n" to be cut off in just the right place. This would have been amusing by itself, but right below a headline about Gay's (almost) world record? And now the AFA gives us this?? I can't take any more, honestly.
Posted by: J Myers | June 30, 2008 10:42 PM
It occurs to me that this couldn't be any funnier if you hired a stable of the best writers. Or some other writers. Or if you convinced a basically insecure group that another, purely imaginary group was out to get them and just let it go from there. Like the Poe Effect, you don't see the stages of fear one after another and there is little way to tell that anything unusual is about to happen. Similar to how some lakes known in recent memory to have always been temperate and inviting suddenly turn over in their sleep and pour large amounts of suffocating gases into the bedrooms of the locals. All die.
Now, while there will always be tiny atolls of confusion regarding the usage of certain words, these are but dots in a vast ocean, a springtide of oceans.
I went to elementary school with a girl named Gay. Back in those days I knew what someone meant when they spoke that word and seeing what a pretty and kind and wistful girl she was, I thought that she was well named. I took a bit of pleasure in thinking that. As if the meaning of a word was exemplified by someone sitting at a desk one row over and two seat back. Clarity. Neat.
Now an ocean of updated usage has washed my soggy notions ashore on a beach strewn with stones of multiple meanings and the driftwood of convention. Picking my way to higher ground is fraught with semantic snares, mined with political undercurrent and booby trapped with subtleties maybe only hours old. Cuss it all!
A favorite quote, courtesy of a math teacher from olden days: "We live in a world of symbols and abstraction and many a man dies by his own cliches."
(Citation, anyone? Please. (Embarrassing to quote a quote and not be able to identify the source.)) :/
The failure of AFA to be able to conceal what was obviously a choice of language designed to lead a reader (more likely, listener) to a predetermined conclusion is typical of the way we all use language. The difference between those who succeed in the long term versus those who succeed in the short term is partially explained by the fluidity of language convention. This is fleshed out by the willingness of the audience to hear what they like. When I don't like what I hear I usually know that something interesting is afoot. I begin the hunt.
Language. A living way to talk. Listen to speech today!
Waxing foolish. Goodnight.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | July 1, 2008 1:25 AM
Taking my cue from the "Gay's", I thought there'd probably be other instances where that slipped through the filter
searched for 'site:onenewsnow.com +"gay's" +homosexual', which revealed http://tinyurl.com/3kj9js, which explains why Homosexual has been feeling run down lately - "Homosexual died in May 2007 at age 86"
Homosexual in this case seems to be a reference to a man called Frank Gay - his name is intact, again saved by punctuation, as "Frank Gay,". I'd guess someone wanted to only change whole words and went a tad overboard.
Posted by: zhasper@gmail.com | July 1, 2008 9:40 AM
OneNewsNow reported that a Homosexual died at age 86?! But I thought OneNewsNow advocated the pseudoscientific view that all homos die off early, by age 45 or so.
Posted by: Adrienne | July 1, 2008 10:38 AM
Actually none of mine has. Perhaps it was those Dick Francis novels.
Posted by: noncarborundum | July 1, 2008 11:29 AM
I thought of this one last night: When I was in seminary, my wife was a copy editor for some community newspapers for the northwestern suburbs of Minneapolis. Editing the sports writer's stuff was not on her job description, but he was a good guy, his wife was a Lutheran pastor, and she felt sorry for him, so she'd do it.
One day she was looking at an aricle he wrote about a high school girl--where he kept referring to her as a "junior breast-stroker." My wife walked in to his office, laughing her head off and asked him, "What does it take for this girl to become a senior breast-stroker!"
The article was re-written;-)
Posted by: Rev. AJB | July 1, 2008 11:31 AM
And a lot of my college years were spent on my parent's moving and storage trucks moving nice Indian families from Chicago to a company in my hometown. BTW it takes about two weeks to get the smell of curry out of a truck.
Posted by: Rev. AJB | July 1, 2008 11:35 AM
They reversed the changes in that page. Heh heh.
Posted by: sunny beach | July 1, 2008 2:43 PM
The tragic aspect of this story is that George Carlin didn't live to see and comment on it.
Posted by: ebohlman | July 1, 2008 3:40 PM
This was very funny. i don't know why all of a sudden they would wanna change words. I think it just comes across as awkward.
Posted by: Free Really Funny Song Parodies | July 2, 2008 1:05 PM
Obviously the OneNewsNow transformation was the result of its bigoted policies, but it's nonetheless possible to have some somewhat more lighthearted, but still borderline, fun with the story of the men's 100 meters. For example, because the eventual winner -- despite running 9.68 -- really didn't get out of the blocks that well, "Gay takes it from behind" would have been a perfectly appropriate headline for a mainstream news story (and might have gotten an editor sacked).
Posted by: kemibe | July 2, 2008 3:45 PM
So, I went and looked at the link and had to smile.
The article has changed
Sure enough - now corrected. However, at the bottom of the article, I saw:
Posted by: John Morales | July 3, 2008 12:26 AM
There's a screen shot of the original at Right Wing Watch. You gotta love the headline.
Posted by: Pieter B | July 3, 2008 11:38 AM
Pieter B's link has the wonderful line from AFA news near the bottom:
Memphis Grizzlies backers hit the hay hoping that Kevin Love would open things up for Rudy Homosexual in the frontcourt.
Oh joy, oh bliss, oh the images! Dontcha all want a bit of Kevin Love, oh yeah, oh yeah, OH YEAH!
Posted by: Sam the Centipede | July 4, 2008 1:32 PM
After tonight, can we expect tomorrow's headline to read "Homosexual unable to go for gold," or more simply "Homosexual goes down?"
Posted by: Traffic Demon | July 6, 2008 2:25 AM
Bummer. Google's cache of the article has been changed and now correct. I wonder if the Internet Archive got a hold of the article before it was corrected... Does anyone have an online link to the original article?
Posted by: Amy | July 12, 2008 10:49 AM
A screenshot of the original article can be seen here:
http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/1937/onenewsnowtysongayew7.jpg
Posted by: George | August 5, 2008 9:52 PM