General election coverage has been dominated by male voices, according to researchers from Loughborough University.
Academics from the university’s Centre for Research in Communication and Culture have conducted news audits for every general election since 1992. They analyse TV coverage from BBC One, ITV1, Channel 4, Channel 5 and Sky’s evening news bulletins, plus print reporting by the UK’s broadsheet and tabloid newspapers.
Since campaigning began on 30 May, only seven of the top 20 most prominent figures in election coverage have been women. In the past week, that figure fell to six.
That stat only makes sense if compared with the ratio of women vs men in politics. It’s either legitimate, or it’s like someone saying “100% of the coverage in the US presidential election goes to male candidates”. I’m not saying it’s as it should be, it’s just maybe the problem is one level deeper, that there aren’t enough women in politics, not that they don’t get covered.
That said, just based on experience with other nations’ politics (I don’t know enough about the UK), it looks like progressives elect whoever based on policy, and it may be a man or a woman, but conservatives in general like their strong men, so in aggregate there are just more men.
My point is, maybe it just goes back to “let’s fix politics”. And all that said, more coverage may get more women elected, but on the other hand, maybe it all should be more about policy, lest we get more Thatchers.
While I agree with some of that, you seemed to immediately spin to the one woman who was shit to represent all women in politics.
Do better.
Where did I say that? All I’m saying is that while the problem that women are underrepresented in politics is a real problem and we should elect more women, since women’s issues also are usually underrepresented, we shouldn’t elect or even cover people because of what’s between their legs.
The Thatcher thing is that for example if the choice is between US Jewish Space Lasers Lady (just so that it’s not the same person again) and her opponent, “voting for the woman” might get you an opposite effect that you expect on for example women’s rights or the over all sanity of politics.
There are a ton of great women in politics, like Sanna Marin, elect more of them. But elect them because of their work, not their genitalia.