“Year after year, we regret the lack of diversity in sports journalism. » The acknowledgment of failure drawn up by Karim Nedjari, general manager of RMC and RMC Sport, has the merit of being frank. The leader believes that only “About 10% of women now make up the sports department” of its editorial staff and that this must change as soon as possible. While the faces embodying sport on his channel are now predominantly male (from the “Super Moscato Show”, to “Rothen s’ignite”, via “L’After foot”), Mr. Nedjari intends to set up a politic “voluntarist” to move towards more parity.
From next year he wants to book “exclusively for girls” the competition for future journalists (the RMC Marc Van Moere scholarship), as well as the two work-study positions. Also, by creating a monitoring committee with short, medium and long-term objectives, it announces strict parity on future sports recruitments.
To show its desire to open a new page, the management of RMC has just signed the charter for greater gender equality in sports newsrooms. Twenty-four newsrooms are now signatories to this charter, including national daily press newspapers (Le Figaro, Humanity, The JDD), regional media (Free lunch, The Marseillaise, The voice of the North) and specialized newsrooms (Eurosport, Olympic noon, Equidia). The management of the France Télévisions and L’Equipe groups have given their agreement to sign the text in the coming days, without having initialed it for the moment.
Push editors
Written by the Association of Women Sports Journalists (FJS), in collaboration with the Union of Sports Journalists in France, and with the support of the Ministry of Equality, this text intends to encourage sports editorial staff, within of general media or dedicated to sport, to commit to a better representation of women and men. “The Paris 2024 Olympic Games will be the first egalitarian Games with as many female athletes as male, this must also be the case for those who tell the story of sport”pleads Laurie Delhostal, co-president of the FJS.
Because, if journalism is a profession today almost equal between women and men, this diversity disappears in sport. In 2022, 33,626 press cards were issued by the Commission for the Identity Card of Professional Journalists (17,431 to men, 16,107 to women and 88 to people who declared themselves neutral).
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