Discrimination and Prejudice Against Female Journalists
About a decade ago I was approached by a female journalist who asked why had once referred to her as "Chris". I responded to the effect of, because this is what you called yourself in an article.
She explained that she experimented with "Chris" because, according to her, if she goes by "Christine", then the readers would negatively (pre)judge her.
That made sense and it was the moment I realised racial discrimination against journalists (or dismissing writers based on their politics, nationality etc.) may have obscured or distracted from a very real and still-prevailing issue of discrimination against reporters based on their name/gender.
We're no longer in the 1970s. Half a century has passed. But this is still a problem, even in the Western and English-speaking world. The largest such country is led by a demented man who tells women reporters, "quiet, PIGGY!"
What can be done to alleviate it? Well, for starters we can shame people who attack a reporter on the grounds of gender.
The reality is, as we noted yesterday, the same is happening in software and hardware projects. Not only are many women (female colleagues) presumed less knowledgable; even if they are faceless and they promote some idea (or code) with a feminine name, there will be prejudice. Some people tested this empirically and their experiments showed that women would have an uphill battle in code suggestions, just for being female. █
Image source: Donna Roma Lister