Gay-Baiting, Not Gay-Baiting

The Advocate wonders if Sarah Palin’s blow-up at Vanity Fair over their hit piece on her wasn’t deliberately loaded with words meant to attack the sexuality of its author.

Is Sarah Palin using code words to slam gay journalist Michael Joseph Gross, a frequent Advocate contributor who wrote the much-buzzed-about profile of the former vice presidential nominee in this month’s Vanity Fair? Palin didn’t mention Gross by name while talking Thursday on Sean Hannity’s WABC radio show, but she seemed to be referring to the article — and pointedly used emasculating words that have long been used as euphemisms for homosexuality — when she called reporters who publish “rumors” about her “impotent,” “limp,” and “gutless.”

GOProud director Chris Barron rushes to Palin’s defense.

“It is The Advocate, not Sarah Palin, who is guilty of ‘gay-baiting.’ I don’t think most people associate the words ‘impotent,’ ‘limp,’ or ‘gutless’ with being gay – I know I certainly don’t. If the folks at The Advocate think these words are euphemisms for being gay or lesbian then I think that speaks volumes about their own internalized homophobia. Governor Palin was absolutely right to use the words she chose to describe the pathetic hatchet job penned by Mr. Gross.”