Andrew Alexander on the Gender Imbalance of the Post’s Editorial Pages

On January 18th, Andrew Alexander published a column on the Ombudsman Blog (which addresses readers concerns about the Washington Post) about the domination of male writers among Post letters to the editor.

According to Alexander, the Post published nearly three times more letters written by men than women. But according to Letters and Local Opinions Editor Michael Larabee, who oversees the selection process, this discrepancy reflects the pool of letters submitted, not a gender bias on behalf of the Post. Neither Larabee nor Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt believe that the Post should set a quota for the editorial pages at 50-50, because it wouldn’t be a true reflection of the letters submitted. As to why the submissions are predominantly male, neither Editor ventured a hypothesis.

The post is not alone in this conundrum. A brief glance over the weekly tallies of the Byline survey posted on this blog reveals a stark imbalance across many major news publications. The OpEd Project’s mission, to expand the range of foices we hear from in the world, with an immediate focus on increasing the volume of women thought leaders in the public sphere, is directly targeted at tipping this imbalance.

Interestingly, the Post sees its primary interest in publishing more female writers as a way to draw female readership back. According to Alexander’s column, a 2008 internal report prepared for Post managers by a Female Readership Committee, consisting of about a dozen staffers, said, “the drop in female readership was noted in 1996 and began accelerating in 2003.” Creating a more diverse editorial page may indeed reverse that trend.

In a few weeks, the OpEd Project will be publishing the results of a 3-month long Byline Survey of the opinion pages of major news publications, including the Washington Post. Be sure to stay tuned for those results, and if you have any thoughts on why so few women seem to submit opinion-pieces, please venture to test them here in the comments section!

Two Tales for Tunisia: Adla Massoud and Anne Applebaum Offer Opposing Views For the Future of the Arab Nation

This past week all eyes turned towards the north-African nation of Tunisia as the country erupted in violent riots that culminated in the ousting of president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia’s leader for over 23 years.

In the wake of Ben Ali’s departure, numerous voices from around the world have offered their commentary on the future of Tunisia. Yet the majority of those  voices have been male. This past week, two women published columns that stood apart from the crowd: Adla Massoud in the Huffington Post, and Anne Applebaum of the Washington Post.

Massoud, a Lebanese/British journalist, published a column in the Huffington Post titled The Awakening of the Arab World, arguing that the riots in Tunisia are an indication that the educated youth of Arab nations have reached a “boiling point.”

According to Massoud, the social and political circumstances across the Arab world make the region ripe for revolution. Arab nations currently hold the highest unemployment rate in the world, and twenty five percent of youth between the ages of 15 and 29 are without jobs. As a large conglomeration of educated youth enter a world without  job prospects and no future, Massoud argues “the Arab people are finally rising up.” Indeed, the revolution in Tunisia is believed to have been sparked by the suicide of a young man who could not find a job and was barred from selling fruit without a permit.

In contrast to Massoud’s hopeful and deterministic rhetoric, Anne Applebaum of the Washington Post published a column warning against placing blind faith in the ability of the Tunisian revolution to usher in a new era of secular, democratic leadership.

Applebaum argues that although the rapid and dramatic developments in Tunisia this past week have been exhilarating, it is important to remember past consequences of similar popular uprisings. Citing the 1979 revolution in Iran, the Orange revolution in Ukraine in 2004, and the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square, Applebaum warns that street demonstrations often result in continuing violence and a worsening of the political situation.

Although Applebaum, like Massoud, sees the educated youth as the leaders of the revolution, she argues that the developments in Tunisia don’t represent a democratic revolution. Instead, Applebaum argues that we are witnessing a “demographic revolution: the revolt of the frustrated young against their corrupt elders.” Although Applebaum finds hope in the ousting of Ben Ali, she argues that a peaceful and orderly transition of power would have present a far more hopeful prospect for the future of Tunisia.

Whether Massoud’s optimism or Applebaum’s warnings prove more prophetic, it is great see two such distinct, insightful women leading the debate over the future of Tunisia on the op-ed pages. If you have a different opinion or insight on the future of Tunisia and its impact on the rest of the Arab world, take the plunge and voice it!

The Last Opinions of 2010

Happy 2011 from all of us here at the OpEd Project! New years eve marked the last day of the three month byline survey, make sure to stay tuned for the final report to be released in the coming weeks. In the mean time take a look at these notable female -authored op-eds, published in the final hours of 2010.

Peggy Noonan of the Wall St. Journal published a piece on the origin and cultural significance of the New Years anthem Days of Auld Lang.

Susan Jacoby, the author of the forthcoming “Never Say Die: The Myth and Marketing of the New Old Age,” published an op-ed in the New York Times entitled Real Life Among the Old about the aging baby boomer generation.

The Washington Post released its top ten most-viewed opinion pieces of 2010, only two of which were authored by women and neither of whom are regular contributors to the Post. The eighth most widely read was a piece entitled Sarah Palin is wrong about John F. Kennedy, religion and politics written by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, the the niece of President Kennedy. In her piece, Townsend takes issue with Palin’s criticism of Kennedy and with her implication that politicians should have to pass a religious test. The second most widely read op-ed was Oval office rug gets history wrong by Jamie Stiehm. Stiehm pointed out that a quote in the new White House rug that was being attributed to Martin Luther King Jr. actually originated with progressive Bostonian Theodore Parker. Hopefully 2011 will see the publication of a larger percentage of female authors across all news sources.

Here are the results from the last week of the byline survey:

 

NYT         WSJ           WP           SA         HP         DB

%W            29           16          14            15           25           35

%M             79           84          86            85           75           65