Debate Flares Again About Why There Aren't More Female Opinion Writers

By: E&P Staff Connie Schultz' latest column, which asks why there aren't more women writing for newspaper opinion pages, has drawn strong reaction from The Nation's Katha Pollitt.

Schultz, a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, reported that there was discussion at a Washington, D.C., roundtable she attended last week about the reluctance of some women to do Op-Ed commentary.

"As [the mostly female roundtable participants] hashed it out," Schultz wrote, "it became clear that we're never going to change the gender equation on Op-Ed pages until more women are willing to take on the risks that come with writing for them. Linguist and author Deborah Tannen said what all of us already knew from experience, that women have good reason to pull back because they are attacked for stepping out. Sonni Efron, who solicits and edits opinion articles for the Los Angeles Times, said she has to coax some women not to pull their punches."

Schultz, who's syndicated by Newhouse News Service, added: "In the world of public opinion, there is a certain shoot-and-duck quality to the skills needed in taking aim without so much as a sapling for cover. ... As my own editor warned me when I first started writing a column, at least a fourth of the ugly mail will be from men who think I have no business getting paid to give my opinion. Darned if he wasn't right, too."

The Plain Dealer columnist said "awful calls and letters bother me, sometimes a lot. I just don't let them stop me."

Pollitt, in a letter posted Tuesday on Jim Romenesko's media blog, responded: "Another fiesta of handwringing and blaming the dearth of women columnists on women's lack of moxie. I can't stand it! Women now make up half of all med students (Blood! Gore!...), half of all law students (arguments! crazy clients!...). Women are increasing their numbers in virtually every male-dominated profession from engineering to politics -- except opinion journalism. For this, and this only, women are just too shy and nice. I don't believe it. The truth is, women are still perceived as a special interest on the Op-Ed page -- one is enough, just the way one person of color is enough. ... (T)here are plenty of women RIGHT NOW who could take on a column and do brilliantly."

Pollitt added: "One point that is rarely raised is that women writers are disproportionately liberal and feminist in an era in which the media is rather conservative. These days, conservative papers less often bother with having a resident liberal. ... At the same time, liberal or centrist papers bend over backwards to prove they're neutral. ... The big irony will be that if women writers and readers ever succeed in pressuring papers to hire more women columnists, the jobs will go to women who will write, endlessly, about the evils of working mothers and the usefulness of torture as a foreign-policy tool."

E&P reported Aug. 15 that the percentage of women opinion columnists at the eight biggest syndicates is only 24.5%.