Amnesty TV launches with 11 men and 0 women on its production team

[Bidisha]

bidisha-online.blogspot.com/2011/07/to-coincide-with-its-50-th-anniversary.html

Is this really a product by the same charity that tells us "Women's rights are human rights" on its web site?

Actually, I remember contacting Amnesty once about a woman's issue, which I believed to be a human rights issue. It was a Morrocan immigrant mother in spain who had her baby taken into care because she refused to stop breastfeeding . The child wasn't even two. You haven't heard wrong. THe state decided it was time for her to stop and because she didn't they put her daughter in an institution

Anyway, I contacted Amnesty and didn't even get so much as an automated e-mail.

Now I understand why.
Are women human?

Sakura,
I do not think this 10 men are the ones to blame, really. I think AI has made a mistake, a big one. And I really hope they will rethink all of it and be wiser.

They seem to have tried in other areas. They are what they are, an NGO established by white men to fight for prisoners rights and torture. As they have become global in their action they have had to reconsider this. From where I watch (I am not a AI member, just from what I know) they have expanded their action to other rights and also recently introduced clearly gender and women's rights.

Obviously this has to be reflected not only on the scope of their action but also inside their own organisations.

I

Did not see your other post Sakura about the Morrocan mother. In case you do not know what happened to her next: after thousands of mothers and some organizations put lots of pressure on the government (I do not think AI among them) the case was reassessed and she recovered her daughter. It was a terrible case.

What a fucking load of shit. I bet the special boys club had a lovely time dreaming up this lot at the bar of Shoreditch House.

I do think some of the 10 men are to blame, camaleon, because clearly from their existing professional links they've recommended/hired each other. And you'd have to be incredibly short-sighted not to scan down the team list and realise that perhaps an alternative perspective might be welcome.

IMHO this is a case of AI getting too much into branding themselves as hip (they've done a lot of being at parties getting artists and musos to be photographed holding Amnesty signs recently - no bad thing in itself) and as a result losing the plot.

Quodlibet,
Precisely because these men are not precisely human rights activist/experts/whatever and are so used to get hired the way you are describing it does not strike me as bizarre they have just accepted the contract or whatever agreement to work with AI.

They may probably believe they are contributing to a fantastic cause. They may even be doing it for half the money then normally charge (no idea about this... just guessing). I do not expect them to think otherwise at all. I do expect very different standards from AI though.

Yes Quod. IME/IMO Amnesty bosses who might not be used to media stuff have probably just "left them to make something cool". It's really important that the end product is good, funny etc as otherwise it's a big waste of time and money, but bonkers really to think that no-one would care that it's a load of pretentious, pretty juvenile white middle class boys getting together to speak up for "the oppressed". Piss off, quite frankly.

camaleon
I didn't say the 10 men were to blame. I said they were handed their jobs on a plate because they're men. Society is structured to make it so.
Considering the job they were given, it's very strange that none of them joined the dots. Proves they're incompetent really doesn't it!

BUt thank you for letting me know about what happened to that Morrocan mother, camaleon. It was an awful case. Look how much energy we women have to use to get justice for one woman because some grey-headed men at the top who hate mothers have made the rules.

I got a response back:

My colleagues have now had the opportunity to consider the feedback that we've received regarding Amnesty TV, and I would like to pass on their response as follows:

We were grateful for the feedback in Bidisha?s blog and from those who took the time to phone in to Amnesty and comment on Mumsnet and other forums. We take the content of any complaints seriously, and convened a review meeting on 3rd August to look at the matters raised.

We know there are barriers to participation for women and people from minority ethnic communities in the UK media industry in general and in TV production specifically. Women make up 39% of the film production workforce with only 15% in the camera department.

The internal Amnesty TV team has a 50:50 gender balance. Unfortunately this was not communicated in the press release, which focused on the names of the many high profile volunteers who have contributed to the production of Amnesty TV so far. To some degree this reflects the nature of the industry we are venturing into for the first time. We do understand that the communication around the project raised concerns amongst some of our supporters, and we have learnt from this. We are also committed to looking at ways to ensure that opportunities to support the project in a freelance or voluntary capacity are available to a diverse range of talent.

(ENDS)

I hope that the above will go some way to addressing your concerns over this issue. If you have any further comments you wish to add to the feedback you have given us, please let us know.

Thank you again for contacting us to let us know your views.

Best wishes,
Gordon Bennett

Surely this man's real name is not Gordon Bennett? Is he taking the piss?

So, never mind that the first episode has a message from Aung San Suu Yyi, a piece about the female drivers in Saudi Arabia and features sketches from Smack the Pony.... I grant you that in an industry that is pretty balanced gender-wise it rather odd that the team is all male, but should we really get so excited / upset? Maybe they were the teams who happened to be around? If it was an all-female team would we get upset that it wasn't representative / valid? Doubt it...

Are we saying that if it just happens to be the case that the people who present themselves to do a job all happen to be of one gender or race we should knock a few back until someone 'diverse' pops up? Is this thread an argument for quotas?

I dare say that the Amnesty gig isn't exactly well paid by the way... a lot of the work is done by volunteers.

I don't get it. Are you saying every department everywhere should be 50:50?
A large organization could have an even split but as you break down the departments the balance could skew. Besides, why should people have to pick shit employees because of their genitals? If the best 11 are (identifier x) so what?

Lots of jews in Hollywood, is that a conspiracy? Should they be looking in the mirror and blah blah blah

Correlation does not imply causation

Way to go Sakura for completely devaluing the highly-talented people who have volunteered to give up their time to create an entertainment channel that provides a forum for human rights issues... "How can they look in the mirror knowing they only got the job because they have a penis" Nothing to do with their abilities then? Talk about blinded by your politics...

You are, most likely, considereably more sexist than any of the people at AITV.

"Are you saying every department everywhere should be 50:50?" No somethingwitty - but 11 to 0 isn't any way shape or form representative of a gender balance. Plus none of those 11 people seem to have human rights experience.

"Besides, why should people have to pick shit employees because of their genitals?" Precisely!

And at jenny saying sakura is sexist.

If you're creating a medium for human rights issues do you want experience in human rights or experience in the medium you are creating?

Yes, Sakura is sexist. She is dismissing the talents of the men who volunteered to undertake this worthy task and reducing them to their gender. Sexism; look it up.

Hello - in the increasingly sordid Amnesty TV saga, as everyone is crawling all over themselves to get around the reality of the whole "11 white male producers, 0 women" power-club, I have been contacted by yet another member of this club, Chris Atkins, who has worked on one major human rights project called taking Liberties. His email is fair, clear and lengthy, Taking Liberties sounds important and interesting and I have printed it in full, along with my apology and response.

www.bidisha-online.blogspot.com/2011/07/to-coincide-with-its-50-th-anniversary.html

Amnesty's response, clipped above by another Mumsnet user, is sadly typical of large organisations. I am sure the "internal team" certainly is 50:50 men and women. I am sure, in fact, that the majority of all support staff, admin people, event producers, fixers, managers, executives, doers, campaigners, champions, volunteers and other people whose incredibly hard work, devotion, good faith, good thinking and efficiency are used, exploited and unacknowledged are women. This is the case everywhere. We live in a society which uses women's labour and does not credit it.

What I know is this: Amnesty send me a long and detailed press release about the launch of Amnesty TV. Its named major players are 11 white men and 0 women. Even the top producer, Neil Boorman, does not deny this in his email to me and neither does Chris Atkins, another of the team, who has written only to counteract the claim that of the 11 men on the team, none have human rights experience. I acknowledge my error and have amended the piece. Of the 11 men and 0 women producing Amnesty TV, 1 has worked on 1 project.

I am sure there are no secret women in secret, unnamed, un-publicised but equally high-status, useful and important roles in the Amnesty TV project. Naming is power itself : the 11 men named in the press release, which is probably sent to journalists and media outlets globally, will benefit hugely from their association with this project. The equal number of women on this 50:50 totally equal project team (ha ha) will not, because they have not been named publicly. They will not be interviewed about it, their work will not be requested by other people who want to collaborate with them, they will not be celeberated or seen as associated with the project at all, because Amnesty did not even bother to mention them.

Hello - a very funny update. Chris Atkins has emailed me again and written, "I could have a debate about how positive discrimination harms the very people it is supposed to support."

www.bidisha-online.blogspot.com/2011/07/to-coincide-with-its-50-th-anniversary.html

LOL. Sorry, but how does positive discrimination harm men?

And how gobsmackingly arrogant. Let's have a discussion about things I want to talk about, which I consider important, because what you're talking about is displeasing to me and I get to set the agenda.

Right on.

"I could have a debate about how positive discrimination harms the very people it is supposed to support."

'To support' presumably means women and the discussion currently being undertaken being that they should have rejected the help from some of the male 11 internet-broadcast professionals and waited for some female volunteers. This is called positive discrimination. Allen is neither suggesting that it harms men or a change to his own personal agenda.

Don't you just wish some people could read and comprehend a little better?

My point is that we already have positive discrimination. In favour of men. No one notices because it's the default.

I'm not sure if you understood that Jenny but pretended not to in order to have a dig at me. If it's the latter then it's pathetic. If the former, then it's understandable from you.

Sorry the former should have said something along the lines of you may genuinely not have realised that's what I meant.

Because most people don't realise that that's what we've got. They just accept it as normal.

Including Amnesty it seems.

How many should be not white, how many should be homosexual, how many should be disabled, how many should come from socio-economically disadvantaged area?

Once you have decided what the quotas are going to be, what happens to those who have to be sacked to make room. What will the hetrosexual white nurses and teachers who have been sacked do?

When a new country joins the EU and they have to be quotaed in to your utopia who will pay for the retraining of the British nationals who have to leave to rebalance their untermensch status?

Does noone hear have DS? I do, and I see how hard it is for them. How are you able to sustain such hatred, which if directed to blacks or jews why be screamed down?

What are you talking about somethingwitty? the inly hatred constantly expressed on mn, is that which is expressed by the tiresome men's rights activists who are so easy to spot and think no one's noticed them.

Pointing out that white, middle class, heterosexual, able-bodied men are privileged versus the opposite group, is not hatred. Getting angry when people point that out and accusing those pointing it out of hatred, looks very like projection to me.

Oh, definitely clear as mud...

jenny can you cut out the personal digs please.

It makes you seem like you have an axe to grind - which I am sure you haven't