By: Scot Bear Re: Re: Triangle, AFA Share Fame THE AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN Box 670,Austi

By: Scot Bear
Re: Re: Triangle, AFA Share Fame

  THE AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN
  Box 670,Austin,TX,78767
  -(Fax 512-445-3679, print run 177,040)
  (E-MAIL:   letters@statesman.com)
  Tuesday, January 9, 1996

          TRIANGLE, ANTAGONIST SHARE FAME
  By Don McLeese, American-Statesman Columnist

     Newsweek called last week.  So did The Associated Press,
  Reuters in London and a radio station in Toronto.  Until
  conservative broadcaster and political activist Wyatt Roberts
  started his campaign against the Texas Triangle --targeting
  advertisers of the Austin-based, homosexually oriented free
  weekly -- neither was a blip on the international media
  screen.  Now, neither expects the phone to stop ringing
  soon.

     "I don't think the end is in sight," said Kay Longcope,
  the Triangle's founding publisher and editor.  "He's now
  writing letters to pastors of churches, suggesting that
  people be discouraged from shopping with Triangle advertisers."

     "I want people to know where they're spending their money,"
  said Roberts,head of the American Family Association of
  Texas, who insisted he is not trying to run the Triangle
  out of business.  "I would like to see them clean up their
  act. ... Advertisers should be responsible for where they
  spend their dollars."

     As polar antagonists, Roberts and the Triangle have done
  so much to raise each other's profile that a cynic might
  suggest a conspiracy of common purpose.  What Communists
  under every bed were for Sen. Joe McCarthy, "The State's
  Gay News Source" -- as the Triangle proclaims itself --
  has become for the broadcaster. His previously obscure Saturday
  morning talk show on Christian station KIXL (970 AM) now
  finds itself a lightning rod of controversy, with plenty
  of new listeners.

     As for the Triangle, it couldn't hire a better publicist
  than Roberts. Though it estimates its statewide readership
  at less than 40,000, copies have been disappearing from
  stands since the mainstream media began airing Roberts'
  charges of "pornography."

     Those looking for sleaze are likely to be disappointed,
  since the Triangle tends toward sober-minded coverage of
  issues that concern gays and straights. The paper accepts
  none of the sexually graphic advertising -- 900 phone lines
  and the like -- that subsidize so many gay freebies (and
  straight ones as well).

     Rather than succumbing to threats of a boycott, most
  Triangle advertisers have continued to support the publication,
  with new ones signing up to show support.  The campaign
  has even begun to boomerang at the radio station,which insisted
  that Roberts steer clear of the issue.

     "They're real uncomfortable about discussing that subject
  at this point," said Roberts, who has been exploring the
  possibility of taking the crusade to cable access TV.  "I'm
  disappointed, but they own the station, and it's their right
  to do whatever they want."

     The same right that advertisers have been exercising.

     "The outrage of the business community is very apparent,
   as well as the outrage of the mainstream community," said
  Longcope.  "It's clear that they're not going to tolerate
  intolerance.  One thing we all know is that Texans do not
  like to be told what to do."