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Adam Nagourney vs. transgender people

Adam Nagourney is an American writer and anti-transgender activist. Nagourney’s dismissive views of trans and gender diverse people have been noted by peers and historians.

Nagourney and Jeremy W. Peters claimed in the New York Times that there is a “medical disagreement” in 2023 about trans healthcare. There is clear medical consensus on best practices which is opposed by a conservative fringe minority.

Background

Adam Nagourney was born on October 10, 1954. Nagourney earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from SUNY Purchase in 1977.

Nagourney joined The New York Times in 1996.

1999 book Out for Good

Nagourney has long been known for dismissive views of trans and gender diverse people. Dudley Clendinen and Nagourney co-authored the 1999 book Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America. By the late 1990s, only out-of-touch old gay cis men called our rights movement “gay rights.” The most common inclusive term at the time was GLBT (later amended to LGBT).

Nagourney’s coverage of the activism in Minnesota that led to the nation’s first transgender-inclusive human rights laws reveals this anti-trans bias:

As Donna Cartwright has pointed out in “Distorting Mirror: Trivializing and Silencing Transgender people in Queer Media,” (Transgender Tapestry Magazine), even one of the most extensive accounts of that history, Adam Nagourney and Dudley Clendinen’s Out for Good, “treats [trans people] largely as a disempowered, voiceless ‘other.’” In their account of the Minnesota struggles about trans inclusion, for example, Cartwright notes that Nagourney and Clendinen “primarily quote opponents of trans-inclusion, and to a lesser extent, gay advocates for transgender rights,” while failing to let the voices of transgendered activists appear in their narrative. Cartwright also points out that “their description of us ‘gender queers’ virtually drips with condescension.”

References

Klein, Charlotte (February 27, 2023). Inside the New York Times blowup over transgender coverage. Vanity Fair https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/02/new-york-times-trans-coverage-debate

Bolies, Corbin (March 7, 2023). The New York Times’ Trans Coverage Debacle Was Years in the Making. The Daily Beast https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-the-new-york-times-trans-coverage-debacle-was-years-in-the-making

Cartwright, Donna (2000). Distorting Mirror: Trivializing and Silencing Transgender People in Queer Media. Transgender Tapestry Issue 91 https://archive.org/details/transgendertapes9120unse https://www.digitaltransgenderarchive.net/files/v979v310m

Nagourney, Adam; Peters, Jeremy W. (April 16, 2023). How a campaign against transgender rights mobilized conservatives. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/16/us/politics/transgender-conservative-campaign.html

Purchase College. Adam Nagourney ’77. https://www.purchase.edu/live/profiles/3378-adam-nagourney-77

Barbaro, Michael (June 1, 2023). How the G.O.P. Picked Tans Kids as a Rallying Cry. New York Times -https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/01/podcasts/the-daily/anti-trans-bills.html

Stein, Sam (March 11, 2010). NYT’s Adam Nagourney Leaves DC to Become LA Bureau ChiefThe Huffington Post. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/11/nyts-nagourney-leaving-po_n_495034.html

Reilly, Patrick (February 15, 2023). New York Times accused of ‘editorial bias’ in coverage of transgender issues. New York Post https://nypost.com/2023/02/15/new-york-times-blasted-for-editorial-bias-in-transgender-coverage/

Bolies, Corbin; Cartwright, Lachlan (February 16, 2023). New York Times blasts staffers who condemned paper’s trans coverage. The Daily Beast https://www.thedailybeast.com/new-york-times-blast-staffers-who-condemned-papers-trans-coverage

Eckert, AJ. What the New York Times gets wrong about puberty blockers for transgender youth. Science-Based Medicine https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/what-the-new-york-times-gets-wrong-about-puberty-blockers-for-transgender-youth/

USPATH and WPATH respond to NY Times article “They Paused Puberty, But Is There a Cost? published on November 14, 2022 (PDF). https://www.wpath.org/media/cms/Documents/Public%20Policies/2022/USPATHWPATH%20Statement%20re%20Nov%2014%202022%20NYT%20Article%20Nov%2022%202022.pdf

Urquhart, Evan (November 17, 2022). The NYT’s big piece on puberty blockers mucked up the most important point about them. Slate https://slate.com/technology/2022/11/puberty-blockers-side-effects-controversy.html

Oladipo, Gloria (February 18, 2023). Nearly 1,000 contributors protest New York Times’ coverage of trans peopleThe Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/feb/17/new-york-times-contributors-open-letter-protest-anti-trans-coverage

Migdon, Brooke (February 15, 2023). NYT contributors blast paper’s coverage of transgender peopleThe Hill. https://thehill.com/homenews/media/3859501-nyt-contributors-blast-papers-coverage-of-transgender-people/

Yurcaba, Jo (February 16, 2023). N.Y. Times contributors and LGBTQ advocates send open letters criticizing paper’s trans coverageNBC News. https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/ny-contributors-lgbtq-advocates-send-open-letters-criticizing-papers-t-rcna70800

Paul, Larisha (February 15, 2023). Gabrielle Union, Tommy Dorfman, more accuse NYT of ‘Harmful’ coverage of trans peopleRolling Stone. https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/new-york-times-coverage-of-trans-people-open-letter-1234680299/

Kalish, Lil. These New York Times contributors say the paper’s coverage of gender issues is hurting trans peopleBuzzFeed News. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/lilkalish/trans-writers-open-letter-nyt-biased-coverage

Hays, Gabriel (February 15, 2023). Celebs rip into New York Times for ‘irresponsible’ transgender coverage: Demand end to ‘both sides’ focusFox News. https://www.foxnews.com/media/celebs-rip-new-york-times-irresponsible-transgender-coverage-demand-end-both-sides-focus

Dunlap, David W. (June 19, 2017). How The Times gave ‘gay’ its own voice (again)The New York TimesISSN 0362-4331.

Klein, Charlotte (February 15, 2023). Nearly 200 New York Times contributors are denouncing the paper’s anti-trans coverageVanity Fair. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/02/new-york-times-trans-coverage

Davies, Rachel (February 16, 2023). The NYT knew what it was doing with its ‘Defense of J.K. Rowling’The Mary Sue. https://www.themarysue.com/the-nyt-knew-what-it-was-doing-with-its-defense-of-j-k-rowling/

Warrington, James (February 16, 2023). How the New York Times was engulfed by a trans culture warThe Telegraph. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/02/15/new-york-times-accused-writers-anti-trans-bigotry/

Mastrangelo, Dominick (February 16, 2023). NYT editors: Paper ‘will not tolerate’ its journalists protesting coverage of transgender peopleThe Hill. https://thehill.com/homenews/3862101-nyt-editors-paper-will-not-tolerate-its-journalists-protesting-coverage-of-transgender-people/amp/

Smith, Ben (October 18, 2022). Inside the identity crisis at The New York Times. Semafor https://www.semafor.com/article/10/18/2022/inside-the-identity-crisis-at-the-new-york-times

Remnick, David (December 22, 2017). A conversation with A.G. Sulzberger, the new leader of the New York Times. New York https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/a-conversation-with-a-g-sulzberger-the-new-leader-of-the-new-york-times

Ember, Sydney (December 14, 2017). A.G. Sulzberger, 37, to Take Over as New York Times PublisherThe New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/14/business/media/a-g-sulzberger-new-york-times-publisher.html

Barron, James (October 20, 2016). A.G. Sulzberger: leading change at The New York Times as journalism evolvesThe New York Times. http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2018/02/ag_sulzberger_new_york_times_p.html

Rogoway, Mike (February 9, 2018). A.G. Sulzberger, New York Times’ publisher and former Oregonian reporter, talks journalism in the digital ageThe Oregonian.

Wemple, Erik (December 14, 2017). A.G. Sulzberger to assume publisher role at New York Times on Jan. 1The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2017/12/14/a-g-sulzberger-to-assume-publisher-role-at-new-york-times-on-jan-1/

Benton, Joshua (May 15, 2014). The leaked New York Times innovation report is one of the key documents of this media ageNiemanLab. https://www.niemanlab.org/2014/05/the-leaked-new-york-times-innovation-report-is-one-of-the-key-documents-of-this-media-age/

Snyder, Gabriel (February 12, 2017). The New York Times claws its way into the futureWired. https://www.wired.com/2017/02/new-york-times-digital-journalism/

Levitz, Eric (October 19, 2016). A.G. Sulzberger Vanquishes His Cousins, Becomes Deputy Publisher of the New York TimesNew York. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2016/10/a-g-sulzberger-becomes-deputy-publisher-of-new-york-times.html

Benton, Joshua. This is The New York Times’ digital path forwardNiemanLab. https://www.niemanlab.org/2017/01/this-is-the-new-york-times-digital-path-forward/

Sulzberger, A. G. (October 7, 2015). Our Path Forward (PDF). The New York Times Company. https://nytco-assets.nytimes.com/m/Our-Path-Forward.pdf

Sulzberger, A. G. (January 1, 2018). A Note from Our New PublisherThe New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/01/opinion/Arthur-Gregg-Sulzberger-The-New-York-Times.html

Resources

New York Times (nytimes.com)

Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)

Twitter (twitter.com)

Instagram (instagram.com)

LinkedIn (linkedin.com)