Not in mainstream media: Christopher Orlet has a perceptive commentary at The American Spectator about Rolling Stone magazine’s refusal to run a Bible ad.

Link: The American Spectator.

The offending ad features a thoughtful young lad and a caption that reads: "In a world of almost endless media noise and political spin, you wonder where you can find real truth. Well, now there’s a source that’s accurate, clear and reliable. It’s the TNIV — Today’s New International Version of the Bible. It’s written in today’s language, for today’s times — and it makes more sense than ever."

I applaud the media for rejecting advertisements full of hate, but rejecting ads that are full of hope just because their not perfectly in line with mainstream? Can’t we stomach a little diversity of ideas? Orlet sums it up:

Just last December, NBC and CBS refused to run the United Church of Christ’s "God Is Still Speaking" commercials, evidently because of what the Church believes Jehovah to be saying. The UCC, one of Christendom’s more progressive and inclusive denominations, not only believes that God is still speaking, but that he sounds rather like Gore Vidal. Contrary to the Rolling Stone debacle, the Christians this time were seen as too progressive for the networks’ target market.

The media has traditionally been first in line to shield free expression rights; it is certainly in its best interest to promote free speech to the utmost limits of the tolerable, in particular a magazine like Rolling Stone that has historically pushed those limits. Obviously the media has a right to reject advertisements its readership will find offensive, but refusing to run an ad for the Bible or a commercial for an inclusive church speaks of a cowardice and hypocrisy that is becoming way too common in today’s media, and is scarcely the sort of quality you want to foster in an independent media. Apparently MTV.com and the satiric newspaper The Onion agree. Both are running the Bible ad.