Discrimination Within the Newsroom: Has it Increased or Decreased?

 Helena Kalantzis

hk043319@ohio.edu

Source from Illinois Institute for Continuing Legal Education

Discrimination has plagued America for decades, creating unfair circumstances, opportunities, and experiences for people who are not white males. However, movements have been directed toward inclusion and diversity in work and stable environments, such as Black Lives Matter and individual workplace diversity programs in recent years. Within newsrooms, where diversity is essential for accurate and fair reporting, have these programs and movements been effective, though? According to an audit done on The Inquirer, these programs and movements have not been working. This audit reported that The Inquirer retains most white people in their newsroom, white and male, resulting in articles, photos, and videos that are mainly about white people. Their research found that only a quarter of their work included Black people, three percent Latinx, and less than two percent Asian. However, if you excluded the pieces about sports, Black people only made up nineteen percent of The Inquirer's works. Another research about diversity in the newsroom found that seventy-seven percent of newsroom personnel are non-Hispanic and white, with forty-eight percent of those people also male. This study says how six-out-of-ten newsroom employees are men compared to the rest of the workers. This discrimination isn't limited to just race; however, disabled people and members of the LGBTQIA+ community are also being affected by the discrimination found within newsrooms. It is still legal in twenty-six states to not hire or fire someone based on their gender identity even though trans people are better at reporting trans issues due to them being able to relate to their audience. The disabled community is also facing this discrimination, more often than not being misrepresented, underrepresented, or just upright not being represented at all. With the disability community making up one-fifth of the United States population, this problem needs to be remedied. It begins with how non-disabled people see disabled people. Recently, the AP Stylebook changed the definition previously in place for the word ableism, which Google defines as "discrimination in favor of able-bodied people." However, this only holds power if people utilize this word whenever non-disabled people act discriminatorily toward disabled people. While this is a good step in the right direction, much more needs to be done for all communities that are not getting represented nearly enough in newsrooms across the country.