On Wednesday September 9, in a new report submitted to the government, the deputy Céline Calvez recommends a bonus-malus system to encourage the written press to count women in their columns. Eternal fight is that of the voice of women in the media. Men are still the benchmark when it comes to expertise. But nothing is played …
"Never forget that it will only take a political, economic or religious crisis for the rights of women to be called into question. These rights are never acquired. You will need to remain vigilant throughout life.", declared Simone de Beauvoir, in" The Second Sex ", 1949. This quote is at present a very good summary of the place of women in the media. Invisible. Or if, they are present, but according to their socio-professional categories, which the health crisis has successfully brought to light.
"There has been a real decline in the representation of women experts in the media in general. Two studies, one made by the Higher Audiovisual Council (CSA) and another made by the National Audiovisual Institute (INA) prove it.", confirms Aude Lorriaux, senior reporter, specializing in discrimination and gender equality and co-founder of the collective Take the One.
Two studies in the midst of a health crisis
The CSA study, of June 23, shows, and this can be good news, that the overall rate of women (six television and radio news on four different dates were analyzed between the months of March and May 2020) is 41%, the same proportion as in March of last year. But, and this is the problem, the number of expert women invited has dropped sharply.
In the television and radio programs analyzed, only 27% of women are doctors and 40% pharmacists. In fact, the figures are quite different, women in medicine are rather 46% and in the pharmaceutical sector 67%.
The overall rate of female experts fell to 20% in March 2020 from 38% last year.
"The crisis has dramatically exacerbated sexism in the media. It served as a magnifying mirror for the usual failures that were beginning to be masked, mainly in the public service, by contractual commitments on the place of women and experts as well as on the content of programs, since the law of August 4, 2014 for the real equality between women and men.", specified on May 6 on High Equality Council.
Aude Lorriaux recalls that, according to the other study, that of the INA, "28% of women were interviewed on television news during the crisis."The journalist tells us that this analysis differs from the others, because she was interested in the banners (located at the bottom of a television screen allowing a news program to provide news in real time and continuously) The Institute was thus able to analyze an enormous mass of data. "Two researchers then used a new and specific grid to determine how many women were mentioned on these banners and what roles they played. The specialists have thus defined authority + and authority -, on the one hand business leaders or politicians and on the other nurses, for example. ", she explains.
To put it simply, women are small hands and men are big pundits. A hierarchical sexist medicine. As Aude Lorriaux points out to us, we say "a great spawn" and not "a great big spawn". On the political side too, there is also a concern that is easily seen. During the lockdown, who was constantly on TV? Olivier Véran, Édouard Philippe (at the time), Emmanuel Macron and Jérôme Salomon. Men trust the media.
"We see that women are in the minority in these bands and that the more they are endowed with a certain authority, the more they are invisible, with an attendance rate of 21% in this category.", adds Aude Lorriaux.
More women in the media, a utopia?
The question can arise, because year after year the debates on the invisibility of women do not weaken. However, for the journalist it should be noted that "the CSA Barometer of the Representation of Women in the Media notes an improvement on television, a little less on radio, thanks to incentives for quotas in the public sector. Today there are 40% women in television programs. "
On the question of the arrival of a woman at the head of France Télévisions since 2015, Delphine Ernotte, as a factor in the feminization of programs, Aude Lorriaux admits "that it surely impels something. After that, it's always difficult to know why there are certain developments. Maybe it's due to a changing society."
Regarding the famous cover of Parisian with this world according to exclusively male, Aude Lorriaux explains it by "confinement, where people were teleworking so they did not see each other to talk to each other and anticipate the various concerns. " Newspaper headlines were manufactured in a volatile way. Vigilance on these subjects which are unfortunately not priorities is falling, it is undeniable.
"When MP Celine Calvez auditioned the media as part of her progress report on women in the media during the health crisis, some realized the mistakes made and they are trying to make up for it in the last weeks of confinement", testifies the co-founder of the collective Take the One.
A fight to continue
According to Aude Lorriaux, there are a thousand things to do to continue the progress. First of all, you have to continue your studies on a regular basis and refine them even more. "Today, we have data on women and on non-white people, but nothing on black women, North African men, disabled women … There is very little intersectionality (concept aiming to reveal the plurality discrimination of class, sex and race.)", she confides.
Then, according to the journalist, it would be necessary "that the media report their parity figures much more clearly and that would be compulsory." Currently, the media are not obligated to count. "They are encouraged by the Superior Audiovisual Council (CSA), but it is they who fill in the grids so everything is done in good faith, there is no control.", retorts Aude Lorriaux.
But what our interlocutor strongly points out is the compulsory non-training in sexism within the media. For her, Le Monde "is doing very well" in relation to this question, the newspaper has thus trained all its employees.
Last very important point for Aude Lorriaux, the "gender editorial". The latter should, according to her, be present in all major media (more than 100 journalists). They would have an eye on everything that happens in the newspaper, in terms of photographs (the women put forward), subjects … The New York Times is the perfect example.
In a new report of Wednesday September 9, given to Roselyne Bachelot and Élisabeth Moreno, the deputy Céline Calvez recommends to regularly count the proportion of women in the columns of the newspapers, to trigger an "awareness". A principle of "bonus Malus" progressive would also make it possible to distinguish "those who are proactive on the one hand, and those who do not respect legal obligations on the other " and define award criteria.
Aude Lorriaux, in her last article for 20 minutes, recalls an innovative and interesting tool: the Paritometer. The latter, developed by the newspaper Le Temps, is "a program that scours the site every half hour, finding the names of men and women and turning them into percentages."
Counting, training and prevention are therefore the solutions for a future of female visibility in the media.
Note the first free directory, 100% digital, of all French and French-speaking women experts, LES EXPERTES. he thus proposes "a unique database of women researchers, business leaders, presidents of associations or heads of institutions."A great initiative.