Brava to the three Newsweek writers who take on gender discrimination at their own magazine. In the March 29 issue Jessica Bennett, Jesse Ellison and Sarah Ball ask just how far women at Newsweek have come since 46 women filed a sexual discrimination suit against the magazine in 1970. They go on to describe a culture of sexism perhaps less blatant than the corporate landscape of the 1960s and 70s but harder to confront. It is the micro inequities women face every day that can be hardest to address. Tell me “women don’t write here” “or sell here” or “manage here” and I can deal with that. But fail to give me the choice assignments and instead hand them to my male colleagues and what do I do with that? And good luck getting any support from coworkers – male or female. No one wants to fight the good fight, especially since we’ve been told we already won.
Write the authors, “There’s no denying that we’re enjoying many of the spoils of those women’s victories. We are no longer huddled in secret; we’re reporting for a national magazine, and we’re the ones doing the writing. We have a president whose first act in office was to sign a law that promises equal pay for equal work. Yet the fact that such a law is necessary makes the point: equality is still a myth. …We’ve come a long way, baby. But there’s still a long way to go.”
What I found to be even more revealing than the article is a slideshow on the magazine’s website showing how Newsweek has reported on women over the years.
- There is the cover featuring Bryn Mawr students from 1966. The accompanying article says “for the first time, the career drive in girls exceeds the mating drive.”
- “The Divorced Woman” cover in 1967.
- “The New Woman” cover in 1971 featuring Gloria Steinem.
- The “Women at Work and Home” cover in 1980. The article inside the magazine states, “The women’s movement, after concentrating on legislative action in the past decade, has now vowed to make day care and other family issues top political priorities in the ’80s.” Wow. We’re still trying to make them a priority in 2010.
- Paris Hilton and Brittany Spears on the “Girls Gone Wild” cover in 2007. Apparently, celebrity bad boys got a pass.
- And the Sarah Palin in running clothes cover of 2009.
According to the White House Project, women account for just 22 percent of the leadership positions in journalism. Until women reach critical mass in the newsroom, we can expect more of the same – stories discussing us as alien beings who’s desires to learn, work, have children, not have children, marry, divorce, reach the corner office and the oval office, are radical new ideas instead of the normal desires of 51 percent of the population.
Female bad girls don’t get a pass because, as every feminist knows, ALL males are bad boys so there is nothing newsworthy in that. It would be like reporting on how different grasses grow but they all grow. However, as every feminist knows, females are made of sugar and spice and everything nice so when a female acts like a man then that is newsworthy.
Since females make up 51% of the population why isn’t there a female president? If all females voted for their choice of either Hilary or Palin then they would have won. Clearly few females have faith that another female is good enough for the job. So it is females who run things since, in a free representative democracy, power rests with the voter.