(Lack of) Diversity and inclusion in the News Room

 Myles Jay Wortman

 

Members of color, LGBTQ+, disabled, and many other marginalized communities are no stranger to being excluded in media and the newsroom is no stranger to their exclusion. Lack of representation in media of marginalized communities has been an issue for as long as media has been around. When you live in a society that deems whatever’s “whiter” or “straighter” as superior, it’s seldom that you find identities outside of that in mainstream media. 

Lack of representation in media is very destructive for certain identities as it harms self esteem and makes people feel unworthy of being seen just for being deemed different. This is also harmful because it restricts opportunities of deserving and qualified people just because their identity isn’t deemed as acceptable to mainstream media.

The newsroom is a space where a lack of representation, diversity, and inclusion is especially harmful because this often translates into a lack of awareness. Newsrooms are a place of storytelling so when there’s an absence of a particular identity, their stories usually go unheard and that can be very damaging in a world where so many identities coexist with one another. A lack of awareness leads to ignorance and that can cause prejudices in people because they simply don’t know any better. 

Picture source: Howard University Newsroom

 

 

Media shapes the world so it is imperative that all voices and perspectives are amplified. The stories that a newsroom share should be as diverse as the communities they are sharing them with. When we speak on the concepts of diversity and inclusion, it’s important to note that there is a difference between the two. There is such thing as diversity without inclusion. As the conversation of representation in media heightens, people of marginalized communities have been hired in more media positions, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that they are included in the everyday happenings of the workplace. You can hire as many reporters of color as you want, but if they have no say in the stories they’re reporting, you still have no true inclusion.

According to a  2018 analysis from the Pew Research Center, about three-quarters of newsroom employees are non-Hispanic white, compared with about two-thirds of all U.S. workers. This is totally unacceptable both in the year 2018 and 2020 as both years have held very important elections in this country. How can you present stories to a nation full of individuals with many different identities from a newsroom that consist almost entirely of the same singular identity? What newsrooms must understand is that the quality of their work will only benefit of the inclusion of diversity in the workplace. 

You cannot expect the same group of people to deliver all stories the way they’re meant to be delivered. There is strength in diversity and it can lead to the access of way more stories because there are now individuals from the communities where these stories originate. The media and the world around it is always evolving with more stories and it’s imperative that there are storytellers present to represent stories that they personally identify with.