The Unbearable Whiteness of Liberal Media

[FrodosPet]

(note: Don't blame the messenger. I did not write this article. I am just pointing out for reflection and commentary in this arena of thought)

http://prospect.org/article/unbearable-whiteness-liberal-media

GABRIEL ARANA MAY 12, 2014

On the staff of The American Prospect, I’m the only member of an ethnic minority. That's not because I bring all the variety the magazine needs, or because the editors don't think diversity is valuable. Everyone on the masthead of this liberal publication is committed to being inclusive—not just of racial and ethnic minorities but of women; gays, lesbians, and transgender people; and the poor.

It's not just the Prospect. Journalism upstarts like Vox Media and FiveThirtyEight have come under fire recently for lack of diversity in their hires, but that's largely because they are drawing from the milky-white pool of “existing talent.” In the corner of the publishing industry that caters to college-educated wonks—a slightly fuzzy designation, but I've included most of the publications my colleagues and I read on a daily basis—racial and ethnic diversity is abysmal.

Nearly 40 percent of the country is non-white and/or Hispanic, but the number of minorities at the outlets included in this article's tally—most of them self-identified as liberal or progressive—hovers around 10 percent. The Washington Monthly can boast 20 percent, but that's because it only has nine staffers in total, two of whom belong to minority groups. Dissent, like the Prospect, has one. Given the broad commitment to diversity in our corner of the publishing world, why is the track record so poor?

~ snip ~

"Most of our staff comes through our intern program," says Harper's editor Ellen Rosenbush. "Do we get as many applicants of color as we’d like? Probably not, but we do get them and we have hired them." There's a straightforward reason for the dearth of intern applications: Those who can afford to rely on mom and dad for a summer or a semester tend to be well-off and white.

While publications like The Atlantic and The Nation have begun to pay their interns minimum wage—in the case of the latter, after an intern revolt last year—most publications offer a meager stipend or do not pay at all. Slate pays its interns $10 an hour. Internships at The New Republic, Salon, Harper's, and the Washington Monthly all unpaid. The Prospect pays its interns a stipend of $100 per week. On the bright side, a number of publications offer paid entry-level fellowships: The Prospect's pays $33,000 and includes benefits, The New Republic offers its reporter-researchers $25,000, and Mother Jones gives its fellows $1,500 per month. But money's not the only issue when it comes to interns. Most publications put little effort into recruiting for their internship programs, and the fact of the matter is that a black or Latino kid who grew up on the South Side of Chicago is far less likely to have even heard of The New Republic or the Prospect than a white woman growing up on the Upper West Side.

~ snip ~

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Until more educational opportunities and paid internships present themselves, the progressive voice will remain primarily caucasian.

Even here, I believe we need to reach out to a more diverse community and allow and encourage them to speak for themselves.

[Fred Sanders]

1. The historical results of racism, like this, without affirmative action, will lock in the privilege.

[FrodosPet]

2. More than that, we need a culture change

Whites need to be more responsible and generous. And African Americans need to rise up out of the mentality that education makes you an "Uppity Uncle Tom".

Society needs to assist and acknowledge people in the urban community who are working block by block, child by child, to build better communities.

Financial education - both personal and commercial - should be tailored for the audience and become so ubiquitous that no one can escape it.

In short - white people need to quit hating and fearing blacks, and blacks need to quit hating and fearing not being black enough.

Unfortunately, I am just an clueless white guy, so I suspect this is all drivel.