UCC Controversy

Throughout the day, I followed the news story about the advertisement created by the United Church of Christ that was rejected by CBS and NBC. The ad basically advocated tolerance, and seems to be a message from the Church that they welcome everyone, including gays. Yet CBS and NBC rejected the ad.

There were many reasons that could have been given, but this was CBS's (well, Viacom's) reason:

"Because this commercial touches on the exclusion of gay couples and other minority groups by other individuals and organizations," reads an explanation from CBS, "and the fact the Executive Branch has recently proposed a Constitutional Amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, this spot is unacceptable for broadcast on the [CBS and UPN] networks."

Huh?

You're kidding, right? A proposal of an amendment by the President makes an ad spot unacceptable?

I really don't have much more to say about this, besides how ridiculous it is, because everything I can think of has already been said on various different blogs. One good thing that has occurred between the time I originally wanted to write this post (this afternoon) and now is the "mainstream" media picking up on the story. When I used Google News around 5 pm Central Time, there were only like 10 publications running the story. Now we're up to 136. That's good. At least it's being put out in the open.

I can't help wondering - What is the problem with an ad that embraces differences and tolerance? One would think that that would be an important "value."