Wow. Newsnight tonight was dominated by women. Is this your DHs doing Justine?

[YoniMatopoeia]

Female presenter. Mostly female talking heads/opinion givers (only one man I saw but I missed a bit in the middle)

It reminded me how rare this is.

How sad is it that our media is so male dominated.

Sorry if I am not completely coherent. I may have had a v hard day at work and a little wine.

[78bunion]

They are points worth making. there can be problems if the press though and blogs keep saying things about women which are not true of most of us eg that most want to work 2 hours a day or most women are useless at public speaking or asking for more pay. There are lots of us who for decades are not in that category and if we keep saying all woman are XYZ we might make those women who are timid and scared of putting themselves forward think ah that's okay, I am like all women, I need to push myself.

[ModeratelyObvious]

Good post, Paj

[Pajimjams]

Great to see 3 women, of completely different political opinions, on question time last night. It's really inspiring for someone like me to see women of all ages demonstrating the self belief, resilience and having the opportunity to air their views.

I suffer from terrible imposter syndrome, and am starting to ask myself why I am holding myself back when men in my position are, in general, much more high profile & self confident about their abilities.

I heard a great phrase on radio 4 this week- women can be more afraid of success than failure.

I do acknowledge my enormous generalisations here, by the way.

[Pan]

Have PM'd you to not give it any more legs here.

[YoniMatopoeia]

Pan. I need details now. Linky?

[ButThereAgain]

I do like Newsnight too. Bit fed up with Jezza Paxman's relentless self-parody, but at least he isn't as bad as John Humphrys on R4 Today Prog.

Lots of news outlets seem to be trying hard to increase women's presence at the moment. The Guardian annoys me, though, because it seems to do it rather cheaply, by giving space to third-rate woman CiF bloggers on any old issue that can be dubbed a wimmins thing, rather than seeking out the plentiful professional expertise among women (like Maria Misra) who aren't desperate to blog because they have billable, rather than freebie, levels of knowledge.

[Pan]

oh no Yoni it was a minor storm which MrJustine sorted sharpish - just lent a degree of irony to the thread.

[ButThereAgain]

Just echoing the praise for Channel 4 News, which does seem to do a good job of including a range women's voices. I have particularly enjoyed Maria Misra* in a couple of interviews recently (esp when she walked all over Max Hastings). How come Channel 4 News is so good when Channel 4 as a whole is pretty ropey? I have more or less adopted it as my sole TV news now.


*Even though she beat my DH in a job interview a decade or so ago.

[YoniMatopoeia]

Sorry pan. Not aware of the event you were referencing. I don't often catch NN as I leave for work before 6 and so am not often up that late.

[ModeratelyObvious]

[TiggyD]

Yeah, lets kill him girls female adult humans!

[ModeratelyObvious]

[Anniegetyourgun]

:)

[Pan]

You lot kill me most days.

[Anniegetyourgun]

Too little, too late, Pan. We have to kill you now.

[Pan]

Yoni

I was being slightly playful about a recent NN event (for which apols were properly issued in a timely way), though obv that didn't come across so well.

[ModeratelyObvious]

Agree that it's great, but the thread would never be titled "...dominated by men" if it was 80-90% men.

Ah, well, we'll get there one day

[78bunion]

Paij, sorry, better not say but related to business. I agree women are doing better.
I have usually seized chances offered but it's often a huge effort, an early taxi at 6am to go to some recording studio or a nominal or no fee and if it usually leads to no new work/money then it's difficult to make yourself do it just to increase your personal brand's exposure.

I agree with those above that having panels with more women than men matters. Also the law of threes is often quoted - on Boards of directors once you have 3 women "woman"stops being a strange rare thing and they become people which is not so easily the case with just one.

The other thing I look at is the obituaries in the Times. Sometimes now there will be 3 women which is lovely to see (and not just the wife of XYA). Most days it is 2 or 3 men only.

[YoniMatopoeia]

Are you saying that the majority of the women on NN have been boring pan ?

[Pan]

Crumbs, is there no shame re the 'boring and female' Venn Diagram on NN of late?

[TiggyD]

We're all the guests interesting? #

[NiceTabard]

Newsnight is v good for this, I have been boringly commenting to DH most nights for months "oooh look it's loads of women again how unusual is that, isn't it great" etc etc.

To see a female solo anchor of a serious program interviewing female experts over the video and having groups of female experts in the studio is just so brilliantly refreshing.

I also think that the male presenters on Newsnight are v au fait with and sensitive to sex type issues, ditto channel 4 news.

[nameequality]

Justine - make sure your DH knows about thewomensroom.org.uk/findanexpert.

They have lots of expert women who are registered with them and this was set up to try to combat the problem of media saying the couldn't be bothered to find any women for their programme/article.

[Pajimjams]

This is very interesting. What's your area 78bunion if you don't mind me asking? I agree with your reasons for women sometimes turning down opportunities, but I have noticed an increase in female representation. Still a long way to go!

[YoniMatopoeia]

Hello Justine :)

(Norma Stanley Fletcher here under nc )

I have heard it reported that women of equal experience are less likely to put themselves forward for expert opinions/debate.

Then sometimes when they do, you get the Mary Beard reaction.

There is also the view that women are socialised to think they have to justify their opinions more (where a man might just state his).

Not that it works that way on here.

And Justine seems quite happy to appear on the box