it does, i mean, it took a lot of time for that to set in. so it, it won't go away with just one b r with just one case. but definitely knowing that miss hill, if you find the case, if you, if you stand your ground, but you have a chance of finding ross, i was back at work immediately after her acquittal rattler, journalists chasing stories which renewed hope that freedom of the press is of value still cherished by many filipinos. born below al jazeera manila. now would season his underway in hollywood, but a few stars a carney missing in action after testing positive for cove it following the golden globes. jamie curtis and michelle pfeiffer announced they contracted the virus along with the band cheese of intern act as colon foul and brandon gleason. they were nominated for best actor best, the poor thing in the critics choice awards, which shirt they had to miss in the end. ah,

just a quick look at the main stories of following now and ukraine's interior minister, dennis, when asked risky and his deputy has been killed in a helicopter crash in bovary just near keith. at least 14 people died including a child. the helicopter came down near nursery, slamming into a building and causing a large fire. official say it's too early to determine what caused the crash thread head near ki, i told her crash plan lashawn is on the internal affairs of you. re, is elise. i hadn't called her room and fell near and kinda gone hunting. oh, you ran on fabulous, hoarse vio, last v. and many more war losing did

because all or or she is for mrs. circle love as compared to west approach to russia to out of out of hitler's final solution. after all, said the u. s. it assembled a coalition of european countries to solve what he called the russian question, using ukraine as a proxy. in the same way the nazis had sought to eradicate europe's jews. it was being at a news conference in moscow is short of an annual review of russia. foreign policy said russia will achieve its objectives in ukraine despite what he called a hybrid war. waged by the west. at least 70 people reported to have died in afghanistan due to extreme cold weather. in the past 2 weeks, temperatures have dropped as low as minus 21 degrees in combo. the emergency operation center says the rise and casualties is caused by widespread poverty and unemployment. israel supreme court has ruled at benjamin netanyahu. miss sag are a dairy who served as his interior and health minister because he was convicted of tax for last year. the decision could trigger

a political crisis for the new coalition. government is very, is head of the ultra orthodox shot party our looking at the role of women in news media. the stream is the program coming up next we'll have a bit more c h on including of course than use our in about 90 minutes time. ah ah ah ah ah hello and welcome to the stream i'm ashley tabby dean. on today's show, why are women still so poorly represented in news media?

take a look at this statistic. in 2020 women were featured as the subject and sources of news stories, only 25 percent of the time. and that figure was found in the latest analysis of more than $30000.00 stories around the world in tv, radio, print, and online sources. so what happens when women's perspectives are left out of the news and how does it fit into the bigger picture of gender equality? well, you can join in on this conversation with your comments and questions via our live you to chat with me. here with us to talk about how women are seen and heard in the media in perth, australia, katherine sine, a senior lecturer in journalism at current university in nairobi, sarah materia, global coordinator at global media monitoring project, and in new castle. in the u. k. we have karen ross, professor of gender and media studies and new castle university. ladies,

i'm so glad that you're with us and you know, just to address sort of the elephant in the room. just so happens that the show topic happens when our usual host, who is semi ok, of course, who is a woman unlike me, should usually be in, in this chair instead of me. so, you know, we're mindful of that. i can promise you, there won't be any mans planing because you are the experts. so we're here to hear from you. let's get straight to it. i want to ask you, sarah, you know, we heard that that statistic, 25 percent of the time. i mean, how would you underline or highlight the real problem when it comes to a representation for women in media? well, the problem of linda representation of women in mainstream news content will most likely be with us for the next 3 to 4 generations. so we're not going to see a parity in our lifetime. and in fact, what we have seen over time is that the piece of progress towards gender equality

has remained very glacial. the needle towards gender parity has moved on be 8 points in 25 years. so really i, the problem has persisted and has remained stubborn over time. and i just like to see this thing better. but in fact, the probability of i, representation, and of visibility in the news is even slim, awful women who are, who come from minority, magical as groups such as racialized in men, migrant women and older women. and mit perhaps i can give an example. yeah. yeah. please, henry is an a, please give us give an exam yes. in the u. k. for it, for instance, the likelihood of under presentation more than doubles for ethnic minority women in comparison to white british women. no, i appreciate you giving us that example because you know, this is not just about, you know, one aspect, but things can tend to be compounded when it comes to women, minorities, as you've mentioned, i see that as you were speaking. i. catherine was nodding,

so i just want to give her a chance sarah, to jump in here, catherine, or what did you make of how sarah sorta framed this issue. this problem i saw you were nodding and i want to know, you know, when we talk about inclusion and then representation, those are 2 separate issues. a why are they important to discuss we, we need to those statistics that the g m m, he has highlighted so consistently over time showed that women are under represented. and that is, that is a huge part of the problem. but the way that women are included in the news is also very important say, including minority groups, including marginalized perspectives, is really important, but also trying to avoid the stereotypes that often come with, including women in the news say, including women and always referencing them as mothers for example, mainly including women to a personal opinion instead of as authority figures. and karen, you, you know,

when you this and then on what, what's been said so far. i'm curious, you've been working on this for many years and i know that you frame it as marginalization as well as stereotyping when we kind of outline the main issues. why those 2? i think that, i mean again, let me, let me give a, a couple of examples when the work i'm doing that the moment is looking at women older women within the media workforce who have been maneuvered out of jobs because of well, so for variety of reasons, none of which has to do with that competence or the professionalism. so i totally agree with, with the point that kind of service been making in terms of the, you know, we have to take a much more into sectional approach is not just about women, it's about, you know, women with particular characteristics. and indeed, you know that there's also issues about older people, but generally being seen, both in, in, in front, behind that the camera in terms of nice rooms and,

and representation. but the point about just opposing marginalization with stereotyping is that it's, if you're doing research around kinda gender made you, it's actually quite difficult to try and, and analyze an absence of the absence of women. you could only really look at where women are present and where women are present. they tend to be exactly, as katherine's mentioned, they are often seen as people who will give ex but who will give public personal opinion be, you know, part of, you know, the, the, the public. we don't see women as experts. and again, just thinking about co fade, you know, we know that kind of health has been seen by much as a domain of women. however, if i think about the u. k. news media and i guess it's the same everywhere else where you would expect more women's voices to come in as x, but within a kind of health context like coping. we just didn't see that. you know, when we, when we looked at the g, m. p in the last, the, the last iteration which was in 2020 right. in the middle of the pandemic. we,

we looked specifically at cars at 19 stories as opposed to yet more general new stories. and again, we just, so we see the same patterns repeated. and the question we have to all surely is why is thought, is it women have nothing to say? because women are not expert, and they also do both. those questions is no, no, of course it's not. and then, you know, that's why we're discussing this issue. and because you brought up the corona virus, i want to get to some of the comments that are coming in on youtube in a moment. but before we do, sarah, when we talk about the corona virus and news coverage, specifically of the pandemic, we know that it skewed heavily to mail experts. you know, i think it was what one 3rd. yeah. one 3rd of sources quoted about the cove in 1900 pandemic were women. i mean only one 3rd. and i'm wondering, you know, what it, what is that actually mean? i mean, you know, why, what is contributing to the problem? is it, are you, are we able to identify sort of the 2 biggest factors in your mind,

sarah? well actually it's interesting because we found that, oh, well i for the longest time that we have been analyzing the science and health stories they've, i, they've always been at the back of the news agenda, occupying about 70 percent of all the topics in the news. but with the corporate 19 held crises, ah, the proportion of stories doubled, 17 percent of the news agenda. and as a, as a news becomes more important gain salience, we find that to women, i been relegated to their margins as, as the people who are subjects or the news or sources of news. which is pretty interesting. i've been there to withheld. yes, i'm sorry. i'm only interjecting to say, it's maybe not surprising, but it's astonishing that, you know, there's that correlation where, you know,

when women's visibility before sort of the attention of, of the pandemic on health. they were higher, more visible. and then once it became popular, all of a sudden they were less miserable visible what's, what's, what's driving now? it's interesting, it seems, lay, cur, you know, as stories become important and on the news agenda. busy women, when you are the other, the they tend to barely get it to the margins. and i really, it's, it's hard to explain that. for example, during the health crises, it is women who are the caregivers. women who are present in, in trying to mitigate the impact of dependent on, on the elderly, on children, on, on the, on general populations. yet when news reporters us was forcing for expert opinion, women,

i think about half of like 26 percent of of those who are interviewed as experts who are present her sources in then as health specialist to women. and when you look at the roof was statistics almost 50 percent of those work in health care women? well, it is really astonishing to find that disparity certain certainly invites a lot more questions. one of those, i'll put you karen. i mean in the u. k. i remember anecdotally that the briefings were largely delivered by men, even though, as we just heard from sarah, you know, i'm sure there were excellent qualified women in the field doing a lot of the work. why is the case in your experience, anecdotally and why is such a little progress progress been made? well, i mean, not even a anecdotally, i mean the best of evidence to, to shows us and even, you know, meet your organisations themselves. mean, the guardian did a really interesting piece of work, a couple about the kind of news,

news teams and foods i've done this. something similar in terms of looking at where women appeared in those cobit briefing speech, which will break, you know, over at a very long period and the over overall, i think that, you know, at least one study looked at something like, you know, briefings over 9 months and the very few women now arguably it's not because they want really x, but women, jenny harry's for, for example, who was a key person who did actually appear occasionally to kind of go to be part of the, the, the, that the panel of 3, which is what we tend to get in the u. k. so it's not like women were entirely absent, but where you expected women to be talking and briefing the public. that was really those very scarcely visible. however, on the other hand, also kind of major organizations, other countries in particular, if i just think about new, say, let new zealand in particular,

we're much more proactive in putting women in front of the, the public. that's where our other countries on the, on the, on the ground that you know, it's, if we think about women's communication style during cove, it, there is a and not necessarily cut a gentler stop, a different scholar stall about she commuting health messages. right? so a lot of the research would suggest that where that did happen, there was much more than that the public, the citizens that you know, who were being addressed by. ready these arguably slightly better communicators actually understood more about cobra on you know, how the, how the bars was working. right. but you know, but part of just to get back to your question like why, why do we get what we get to be one of the reasons i would suggest i can say this because i'm a media academic, i don't work in a newsroom seems to me that partly it's because it's much easier to go to the usual suspects if you will read the us a journalist if you already have

a really good relationship with a particular set of experts or particular such a politicians, you are going to go to those people and so if we think about it might even be unconscious bias or just habit forming behavior as you're saying, you know, i mean, i think so much of human behavior and i'm not trying to just dismiss at that. there's no massage any involved or what have you. but yeah, i think it could be just a product of habit. could not hockman. i mean, i would just so he just let me in the, i mean, i would say a lot this are i love this phrase unconscious bus. because for me, my experience anecdotal or otherwise is most of these bosses or anything, but i'll try in some ways we use this term, but we should just be say, it's conscious, but right there is miss. so you don't worry sex racism. it's almost as if, when you say on conscious bias, like you're, you're giving people a path, if you will, said to perpetuate cotton, you're, you're totally and you're chunky doing that, which isn't to say that there isn't unconscious bias. you know, you know,

there are all sorts of ways in which we're operating, which are, you know, part of the kind of cultural dna. i'm not not, not saying that, but i'm saying that yeah, it's not let you don't know that you're going to a man to yes, good. yes, another man spouting or yes. yes. another which is to say that they don't have interesting things to say, but wouldn't it be so much more interesting to have a range of perspectives from across the spectrum of humanity. right. and i think often and in the media, if i forgive me sir, i just want to jump in here with, with a small anecdote. i mean, for a long time i've said, you know, when discussing the media, the democratization and media, which, which hasn't fully sort of self actualize, if you will, that, you know, there was a time when the only voice is deemed to be sort of authoritative. incredible. we're older white men, and i think those legacies take a long time as we're witnessing to, to change, let alone completely be equalized. i do want to mention know if i will put this to you. i was going to go to catherine. but so many people in our youtube,

i mean talking about bias and talking about i'll just put it straight to you. i mean said thing, the question is when will women be satisfied when they abolish men? completely from the conversations. and then we have maybe a slightly more useful question from our, of a k o. 1988 saying, how can you say women are under represented in media when there are literal quotas and incentives to hire women? they replaced casts and movies with women, even though the films perform poor. so needless to say, there is a lot of sort of massage and i for lack of a better word and our comment section, i don't know thera, do you wanna address those comments before i come to you catherine wet. well, i can see this, and it is that to a large extent or to some extent, you can see that the issue is socialization. carrying, alluded to the issue of culture and in many cultures, particularly in the globe without context. i mean many cultures. women are

socialized girls in me and i thought not to be present in the public eye in the public domain. true. and therefore it becomes, you know, even more difficult for them to, to be present to be visible. but there is an on us here on the news organizations are newsrooms to make the effort to go out and find the c m, and get them to, to speak. you know, one thing that we found in our research is that for the 1st time in since 995, there was a jump in the proportion of women who were thoughtful, expert opinion, between 20152020. and that could be perhaps because the news organizations have taken this critique on board and there have been some, some have taken this on board and, and there have been much rooming of various initiatives to create directories of

women experts. so perhaps it could, this could be, well, you know, one of the reasons we found that that's jump. sure, sure. and let's jump to another expert, catherine, i want to put this to you. i mean, i don't know if you want to comment on some of those comments in the youtube chat. maybe. maybe it's not that productive to do so. but i do want to ask you specifically, i mean, are women then, you know, we talk about socialization. are women then less likely to see themselves as experts less likely to want to be interviewed on tv? how did that sort of play into this? you know, i know there's already been such an erosion of trust when we talk about the news media in general. so how does that work in, in an internalized sense? well, i think the most interesting thing that i found from my research is that overall there is a very high degree of willingness to be interviewed with the women that i have interviewed myself or are done through c o. m got their opinions, re survey research. so i don't,

i actually don't think willingness is so much of an issue. i do think that up with lots of women ah, lack the confidence that men sometimes do have the nervousness is a factor. and so generalist, i think need to be aware of that. and women do have some reservations about up appearing in the news and some of those reservations, i think a justified. and so i think it's really important that journalists are aware of those things and really try to mitigate them and make the, the whole experience as positive as it can. they, i think the, the, the initial approach for an interview is really, really crucial. and part of that is sort of d, mystifying, the whole process explaining exactly what the interview entails, what sort of information the, the generalist is looking for. so sort of, some sort of taking the perspective source through the in i me step by step. could you really helpful and i'm giving out and i think if you give women a ch women

a chance they are, they do want the opportunity to speak. they want the sort of the, the validation and the credibility that comes without them. and i to them, it, mean i'm, i'm really shocked at some of the responses that you're getting on you in a 3, a youtube there. the, when you look at the statistics, they say it's like clear that women are under represented. this is, this is obviously a problem that needs to be addressed. and why shouldn't women's voices being well, i mean, what i do want to, sorry, i do. and i also share, you know, there are some other comments like santa yes me and saying women's lack of representation. and media basically means the exclusion of half of the population. and it's our and in order to develop a country, it is important to include them. we also have people who are saying, you know, that we need to be focusing on this in the arab world. see less larson, thing al jazeera, turn, its critical lens on the arab world. more often that there's great disparity there on this issue. i think it's just important for giving me catherine,

for interjecting but i do want to just frame, you know, women in conflict zones or what have you. i mean, it can be tricky. you know, for some women and certain cultures, there is this association for better or worse, this pressure that you must be modest, you must not speak. you know, i are gardner, a lot of public attention. i mean, these are pockets of the worlds, not the whole world. but you know, so culture obviously plays a role as well. and i'm wondering, sarah, if news rooms continue with this business as usual. what's the real fear in your mind just to put it briefly? well, for sure. i think there's going to be an erosion, a continued erosion of trust in john lithium. at the moment we know that journalism is in crisis. we've heard about media organizations closing. we've heard about many cutbacks in, in the, in newsrooms. and that a region of trust leads the groups that are marginalized,

to found their own. we don't get stations at the margins, which is really not what we want, right? we, you know, we all need to belong to the mainstream. and we need to, we need to have a media that participates a to it's role in building a democratic society, right? you know, in being appeal of democracy and ensuring that all voices are heard. and i, and i see that there are, forgive me. sorry, karen that you were nodding and sarah was making that point there. i do want to share with you that we have a youtube comment coming in from jeanine thing media, especially as prejudice against older women in media. we spoke about earlier. if you're a minority and a woman and it's compounded as well as for the elderly before i come to use her for me, karen, to answer the question, i do want to include one more women's voice. may be familiar to those of you who watch the show. it is none other than family. she sent us the video comment. take a listen. please change a parenting portion to us at the stream. i think the question should be,

why is it not as important to every media organization? we what town several years ago that if we are not representing half of the humans in the world, we're not doing a good job. so every time we sit down, do a show. we look to see where the women in that conversation, what expertise can they bring to us on the street? sometimes you will see more within the men, we are balancing out the universe. it is a mission that we are so proud to be on and it is never over. you can never sit back and think we did it this year. we'll do it again next year. we have to keep checking. but the importance of this is not just to represent women, but once you start to look at under represented groups in the media, you thought see many other communities who also need that platform and what she starts. you count stuff. and it should be noted that, you know,

there are in 202260.74 percent of gas on the stream. we're women, that's up from 54.9 percent in 2021. we've exceeded our gender balance school for the 5th year in a row. and just so, you know, if you go back few years in 2018, we've made a public pledge to never finish a year without at least 50 percent women guests. and it's not just family who is usually the host of the show. but many women who work behind the scenes tirelessly to put the show together and, and you know, i wonder karen are watching some of the questions that from you was asking, what comes to your mind? i mean, looking forward, where are the solutions, what should be done to bridge this gap? okay, so, i mean, i, i love what i me saying and you know, well done elders is the stream of for, you know, being, being in the fun god. i mean, following on in some ways, teed bbc's efforts with a 5050 project, which again they that starts in 2017 doing media monitoring around gender. and us by me says, now they're looking at other kind of us. but so looking at disability,

they're looking at class and that they're looking at minority other racialized minorities. so media organizations are doing things. but can i just say that one of the, the key area that we really need to kind of focus on the gen listened students. because what if we can actually encourage our students to think about issues around equality and, and sexuality while they are still journal journalism students. while they're still developing that croft before they become, you know, get, get into a new east room and necessarily become a acculturated to the norms of that particular newsroom. if we can get them thinking about what, how they want to be job is what, what their kind of moral or ethical code is and get the right thinking about these things. now while the students and just to say again, if i don't think about my own student, my own students at nico, so university, very great. we were running out of time every been working. when i say is that we

have been working with the bbc's 5050 projects, and the more that we could make that into face between jonas in june and newsrooms . we might have some hope of producing john generations of john that for who actually this is part of that didn't have a parent, i'm gonna have to cut you off there. but that is certainly an aspiration. that is a good way to end this. so this conversation one that's going to continue here at the stream. that's all the time we have for today. i do want to thank all of our guests today sarah, catherine and karen for joining us. any more conversations here, the spin ah, ah, con

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