NYT contributors continue to spar with paper’s leadership over its coverage of trans community

The concerned contributors accused the Times of burying or ignoring information about trans healthcare bans

A group of current and former contributors at the New York Times, as well as some subscribers, have sent another letter to the paper of record expressing concern over its coverage of trans healthcare and gender diversity.

Concered Times contributors and subscribers have been trading letters with the New York Times' editorial heads since mid-February to express its concerns over the paper's coverage of trans issues.

The letters point to a slew of articles from the last several months in which, they claim, the Times has followed "the lead of far-right hate groups" by presenting "gender diversity as a new controversy warranting new, punitive legislation."

On Thursday, the group sent the paper's publisher, AG Sulzberger, a letter expressing the frustration they felt in previous exchanges with otherTimes officials further down the ladder. They also accused the paper of harassing staffers who signed onto the initial letter.

"Leadership has repeatedly and falsely claimed that our letter was delivered with a different letter from GLAAD in a cynical effort to dismiss its own contributors and staff as 'advocates' and justify attempts to intimidate and retaliate against Times staff who share our concerns," the letter says.

To put it more plainly, the group who sent the letter seems to be arguing that theTimes is treating them like a loud but ignorable Twitter mob, rather than as members of the institution with serious moral and ethical concerns about the product.

The signatories on the letter claim they have "tried since at least 2021" to address their concerns using internal channels, to no avail.

Signatories claimed that though the paper had some empathetic reporting centered on gender diversity, it diverted "far more editorial resources into inflammatory, antagonistic reporting" that has been "used to accelerate an ongoing campaign of anti-trans legislation."

New York, NY, USA - July 11, 2016: Headquarters of The New York Times in night (Getty Images)

The Times was also accused of burying stories about healthcare bans, like those in Mississippi and Tennessee prohibiting gender-affiriming healthcare for trans children.

"When these and other healthcare bans have passed, the Times often waited days, sometimes weeks to inform readers, if at all," the letter claims. "Even when the paper has mentioned these developments, it has done so briefly, often buried towards the bottom of tangentially related stories."

The Independent has reached out to the publisher for comment.