Homo Sent Home for the Holidays

What a surprise. After a quick six-month stint, the only lesbian blogger at parents.com has been cancelled.

Merry Christmas from the Meredith Corporation, as they officially gave Harlyn Aizley, the sole lesbian mom blogging for their new site parents.com, the pink slip.

It seems Ms. Aizley, the author of Buying Dad and the editor of Confessions of the Other Mother, did not get enough hits on her blog to continue being a valued member of the payroll.

I'm not a fan of Meredith Corporation's corral of magazines. Parents, Baby, Ladies Home Journal, Family Circle are all rags that tend to make middle class white women feel good about themselves as decorators, housewives and mommies. Sure, I'm white and I'm a mom but nothing said in those magazines even remotely speak to me.

Until Aizley started posting. Then I started reading. Her blog, Are You My Mothers? made me willing to fill out all the forms to read her work on a regular basis. Finally, mainstream press found my lifestyle and decided to celebrate it.

Not.

"Each of our brands attracts an enthusiastic audience based on life stage, lifestyle and affinity." Meredith proudly proclaims, under a banner of images of women, their body parts and plenty of smiles. Unless you are a lesbian. No room for our lifestyle, life stages, or affinity.

The top bloggers at parents.com, in October, received about 11,000 unique hits per month while writing about their lives as parents. Straight, mostly white, parents. Aizley, a lesbian, single, and raising her daughter received 6,000 unique hits a month. She had plenty of straight women reading her blog not because they were cruising to find a lesbian experience but because Aizley is a good writer.

I don't want to get too picky but let's look at the numbers. Aizley got more than 50 percent of the traffic of the straight writers that means she outperforming the demographics 10x. And how many are queer parents are out there? 5 million lesbian/gay parents raising 9-10 million children and spending $22 billion on them?

Ah, but that's the businesswoman in me speaking. All those silly little numbers make me wonder who is running the place and if they need to borrow my calculator.

Aizley expresses the world in which she's navigating with her five-year-old daughter with humor, honesty and an edge only a lesbian mom can give -- the reality of what it is to be just outside of the mainstream, trying to be a good parent, and maintaining her dignity. What it feels like when a play date request is denied -- all the normal stuff moms go through and then added fear -- is it because I'm gay?

I've had a lot of straight, suburban moms over the years, who have wanted to be friends, who wanted to be hip, and cool, and come over with their kids for play dates. Nervously, the initial conversations always involved a proud proclamation their near brushes with lesbianism.

I once had a roommate who had a friend who was a lesbian. Really.

To which I would smile, nod and try not to let my eyes roll. They were proud of themselves for being so progressive, and open to the idea that two moms were raising kids in their neighborhood.

Some would even start to flirt, as if I were the ultimate safety net -- another woman who kind of looked like a man but wasn't really one.

They would ask questions about how we got pregnant, was it really true about turkey basters? They were tickled by the idea you could shop for the kind of sperm you wanted -- no being stuck with your husband's family history of manic depression. They were honestly curious.

It created bridges. I knew the next time they met a two-mom family? They would get past some of the silly questions and get to know them. It made life for my kids easier. It made their kids more accepting not only of gay families, but any structure that was different from their own.

Aizley's blog was doing that, online, every day, across the country. The people who wrote in and pleaded for parents.com to keep her? Mostly straight women.

It is not Meredith Corporation's job to be progressive. It's not their job to do anything but sell magazines. They proclaim: "In distinct editorial voices, they address the core categories of home, family and personal development. Across the spectrum, we support and inspire the reader, serving her needs and celebrating her joys."

Just not lesbian inspiration, needs or joys.

Aizley will be finished at the end of the month. I know she will be posting at familyequality.org's blog, a LGBT family resource site. "It's like moving back to my small hometown in the mid-west after fun and games in the big city," she said. "Thank goodness for our people."

Yes, I agree. I am thankful.

But it should not be a choice between preaching to the choir and having the richness of new and different experiences to read about, learn from, acknowledge. I am grateful to write for Huffington Post where I can create some bridges.

Meredith Corporation took a bold step when they invited Aizley to blog, including a lesbian mom in the spectrum.

Shame on them for canceling her.

Comments

[DianeDfromPhoenix]

"I've had a lot of straight, suburban moms over the years, who have wanted to be friends, who wanted to be hip, and cool.... Nervously, the initial conversations always involved a proud proclamation their near brushes with lesbianism."

Oh, thank you for saying that! I know it's whiny to complain, but this has happened with my progressive "friends" increasingly over the past few years...It's so tiresome to constantly face questions about sexuality, which, as a very private person, I'm loathe to discuss in the first place. It's also painful because if I try to change the subject, the friendship usually ends.

Some so-called straight women flirt a lot. If I flirt back, their underlying homophobia (which we ALL have, BTW) rears its ugly head. "Oh my God, why would you think I was flirting with you? I'm straight!" As if that negates their behavior.
In my more rational moments, I know that America is "coming out"--- acknowledging the broad spectrum of human sexual behavior -- a process that has taken me most of my adult life, because I also was raised to be strictly heterosexual. It takes time and is usually not a graceful process. It does sadden me, however, to read about people losing their jobs on flimsy pretense. Doing the right thing is neither popular nor easy. Too bad the Meredith Corporation chose the easy option.

[lungfish]

Trying to read and reply with the page constantly reloading is very challenging...

It seems to me that GLBT issues deserve attention and the whole point of these mags is supposedly about advice and support... even if it is of the white bread variety. They do themselves a dis-service by making arbitrary decisions that reduce the scope of their target audiences.

Seems to me that maybe its time for a publication that addresses the full spectrum and it may have to arise from the GLBT community. Why can't they write for themselves AND for "straight" families? Sounds novel and a little risky but it might not be so... Reverse bias kills a lot of good ideas unnecessarily.

In my chosen field I am constantly having to re-examine our perceptions of the biases and prejudices that we think we are facing and see if we are really in tune with the times or reacting to something that is part of an older paradigm...

[hamletta]

I wouldn't jump to conclusions here. My mom's had a sub to Meredith's "Better Homes & Gardens" since The Year One, and flipping through an issue recently, I noticed one of the monthly home remodeling stories featured a gay male couple.

"Wow! Gay guys in BH&G? Times have really changed!"

"Nah, they've had gay guys in there for years now."

Granted, the articles are generally low-key enough--I can't recall the word "partner"--that more benighted readers might assume these nice young men with a flair for decorating are just roommates, but still....

[infinitedem]

I, too am a lesbian mother (of two boys, no less). I lost my children in a custody battle with my ex-husband in 2002. In the Commonwealth of Virginia, gay couples do not stand a chance.
Unfortunately, I have never read any of Ms. Aizley's work, but will view it on familyequality.org's blog. The magazines represented by the Meredith Corp. in no way express my daily living. I am not a programmed housewife who stays at home and bakes cookies. I believe that they are trying to guilt us into being the stay at home moms and submissive wives that the new society is demanding. I am a normal working mother who is also in a 6 1/2 year relationship with a woman (not as normal as hetero relationships), but we too pay bills, go to the store, work jobs and take care of our family. It is important for women and their families of the status quo to recognise that lesbians and gays with children are the same, other than who we sleep with at night. Their children will eventually run into our children and we all need to know how to deal with it. I myself nor my children have ever dealt with discriminatory parents.
I hope and wish that the future holds a more positive outlook for all kinds of families.

[Marco]

My (closeted) gay great uncle (Gramma's youngest brother) worked at Meredith his entire life after he met his lifepartner in college and they moved back to Des Moines. People who knew our family whispered about their secret all of the time but they couldn't ignore the fact that these two men were generous and giving souls ready and willing to help another fellow human out at any time.

He spoke fondly of Meredith when he was alive but I'm sure he knew that he had to remain closeted in order to keep his job in that day and age.

My Gramma - who I'm so greatful is still kicking - has come a long way in her understanding of her brother especially now that she has an extra grandson in my partner of 11 years. I know that she would be sad to hear that many many years later, a Meredith employee may still have to remain closeted in order to remain employed.

[ThatsNotFunny]

Sexual orientation aside, how long should an unpopular blogger be kept on the payroll?