Journalists Debate Male Bias

Politics and positions in the news media are still biased towards males, despite significant progress during the 1960s and 1970s, five prominent journalists said at the Kennedy School of Government last night.

The panelists said that though women have gained in many areas, especially in attaining management positions, many aspects of journalism still unfairly restrict women's roles.

Most of the panelists commented that an assumption is commonly made that women are unable to handle power or pressure.

At the same time, male journalists have certain expectations about women, the panelists said. According to the panelists, men believe women subjects will be more moral than men and that women journalists will be more attractive.

Gail Harris, a Monitor News anchor and Kennedy School graduate, cited the continuing demand that female television broadcasters be attractive and cheerful.

"The men [on television news] were there to be serious," Harris said. "The women were there to be decorative."

Most anchor teams look like some guy and his second wife," said Caryl Rivers, professors of journalism at Boston University.

Rivers said that because of journalism's male bias, which is "more subtle than sexist," it is difficult to break the tightly-knit circles of news paper top management.

Myths and Coverage

She added that two myths--of women as weak or incapable of handling power--frequently tint coverage and treatment of women.

Ideas about female weakness imply that "[woman] are these crazed hormonal things," Rivers said. "PMS had 30 minutes on Nightline."

In response to a question concerning recent allegations about misconduct by a female associate professor at Harvard Medical School, Rivers said that women get more attention for these types of stories because "they are supposed to be the moral police."

"When women transgress that role, it's a big story," she said.

Nan Robertson, a Pulitzer Prize recipient and former New York Times reporter, focused on the barriers that female journalists face to progress in the field.

She portrayed women as being forced to participate in the news from a symbolic balcony.

Robertson used the balcony, the only place from which women could view the activities of the prestigious National Press Club, for the title of her book Girls in the Balcony, which traces the struggle for gender equality at the times.

In 1988, Robertson said, the salary gap between men and women at the Times was $13,000 for news jobs and $25,000 for business jobs.

"[The balcony] is a symbol of our not being part of the mainstream of our trade," she said.

Panelist David Nyhan '62, a political columnist and associate editor of The Boston Globe, said that in the past four years the Globe has increased its positions and promotions for women.

Of 1000 "white collar" employees of the Globe, 42 percent are women, and 44 percent of recent promotions have been given to women, Nyhan said.

"A great deal more progress has been made on the behalf of women than has been made for minorities," he said.

The forum, was moderated by Ellen Hume, executive director of the Barone Canter on the Press, Politics and Public Policy.