Comments on: Dissing women

By: Katie

Katie — Tue, 17 Oct 2006 15:49:39 +0000

Excellent+site%2C+added+

By: Feminist Law Professors » Blog Archive » Belle Lettre: “What Is Pregnancy Discrimination?”

Fri, 26 May 2006 13:37:23 +0000

[...] At BuzzMachine, Jeff Jarvis posts a “fired-up email” from network news observer Andrew Tyndall about the “terrible message” ABC’s move sends to its viewers. “The demotion of Vargas and her replacement by a pre-baby boomer not only makes ABC News’ long-term strategy incoherent. It displays a woeful tin ear towards the very demographic ABC News was purportedly courting,” Tyndall writes. The “worst workplace nightmare the pregnant employee faces,” Tyndall adds, “is the fear that her employer will find some way not to guarantee her job back on return from maternity leave.” [...]

By: georgetowner

georgetowner — Fri, 26 May 2006 00:46:56 +0000

to those who believe business is just business, and to let go of pregnant employees… who can’t be there for the post partum healing period and to care for a newborn – hopefully with a partner — you should be grateful your mother had you at all. Vargas is one of many women who are waiting to have children, some are deciding not to do this at all becuase of attitudes like this. America falls very short compared to innovative countries when it comes to childbirth, parenting and childcare. Look at Canada and look at Scandanavia… I am a pregnant career woman who will take leave, but I expect my husband to work equally hard to help care for this child. I do not feel women should be punished for taking maternity leave. It’s no different than medical leave, similar to what what Bob Woodruff is needing to take right now…

By: Adam S.

Adam S. — Thu, 25 May 2006 11:43:27 +0000

I think the real error here was to name Vargas and Woodruff “co-anchors” in the first place. It seems obvious to me, if no one else, that if it was going to take 2 of them to do what Peter Jennings managed solo, then neither of them were a good choice.

However, I was happy with Vargas in the end. She had a rough start, but once she got going, it went well. At the same time, I can’t believe that anyone is so air-headed that they could actually believe placing a young woman behind the desk would have any effect on who watched the news. It’s NEWS! It isn’t the weather report, it isn’t sports, and it isn’t one of the many “news magazines.” IT’S THE NEWS. If we name a new editor at the NYT, will subscriptions go up? Unlikely.

Anyways, the bottom line is that Gibson was the logical choice back when Jenning’s stepped down. Neither Vargas, nor Woodruff, had the same face value. Teaming them up just made it obvious.

Given this, perhaps ABC has decided to fix a mistake they made back at the begining. Of course, without some actual reason to believe otherwise, we have to accept the ABC story, and the rest of this is just a lot of hype to get libbers’ motors running.

By: Jim S

Jim S — Wed, 24 May 2006 03:02:38 +0000

At least one report that I’ve seen said that Vargas’ doctors thought this was going to be a very difficult pregnancy for her. Difficult enough to where she was going to have to severely cut her schedule back early on and keep taking it easy for a while after giving birth.

By: Duneview

Duneview — Wed, 24 May 2006 02:23:03 +0000

Tyndall’s analysis of the World News Tonight stories scheduled during Elizabeth Vargas’ tenure does tend to show an aggressive pursuit of a younger audience.

Good for them – all of the evening newscasts have always suffered from older demos, but if targeting W. 18-34 were the sole criteria, Britany Spears would be strapping on the mic behind the desk right now. Far from being “incoherent” the Gibson move may be brilliant. (Tyndall makes an assumption that Vargas has more younger demo appeal than Gibson – maybe he has the Q scores to show that but I’m not so sure.)

The Workplace Nightmare – losing your job after maternity – was not executed when Vargas had her first child, so that scenario is probably pure speculation.

Elizabeth Vargas is a talented dedicated journalist whose skills have been demonstrated over and over again on ABC. But this is a woman who in the last year has seen her husband shot in the head during an attempted carjacking and her partner seriously injured in Iraq. I would suggest those events may alter your life view as you look forward to adding to your family.

And that strikes me as very coherent.

By: clinton

clinton — Tue, 23 May 2006 23:31:39 +0000

Jeff–enough of this media world rot. lets get back to the more universal topics

By: John

John — Tue, 23 May 2006 23:27:03 +0000

And the other co-anchor is recovering form injuries received in Iraq. Way to stand by your people AB.

By: Waldo

Waldo — Tue, 23 May 2006 21:45:36 +0000

“To be fair to ABC News management, its press release insists that the demotion is being made at Vargasâ€™ behest”

Better get Andrew Tyndall’s email to Vargas ASAP! Maybe she will change her mind. Otherwise, Tyndall should just shut the fuck up. But, of course, only at his own behest…

By: Timothy

Timothy — Tue, 23 May 2006 21:36:39 +0000

Seriously, if Vargas requested it, what’s the big deal?

By: Robert Feinman

Robert Feinman — Tue, 23 May 2006 21:03:39 +0000

Name one of the “anchors” i.e. news readers on the BBC? Can’t, that’s because they read the news to the audience, not become part of it.

I’m also not interested in all the PR about how the anchor sits in on all the story discussions and helps decide what goes into the broadcast. If that’s the important job then they can become news editors and leave the on air stuff to a person with good diction.

Enough with celebrity news presenters already.

By: Kiki

Kiki — Tue, 23 May 2006 20:29:12 +0000

I agree with you that it is a mistake, but the original one, I believe was to name co-anchors for the news at ABC. My guess that they never really wanted her anyway, but that she was there to make ABC the first channel to have a woman as newsanchor. Charles Gibson is an acceptable choice, however, I think that the way ABC named it, is a problem, because it seemed like they are putting down Elizabeth Vargas and that they are using her pregnancy to get rid of her.

By: Mumblix Grumph

Mumblix Grumph — Tue, 23 May 2006 20:09:19 +0000

Oprah-izing the nightly news with Mom and kids stories is a loser as far as I’m concerned. And don’t get indignant and accuse me of knuckle dragging and mouth breathing. I’d feel the same way if they peppered the news with NASCAR and Viagra features. This is the Goddamn NEWS we’re talking about. If I want fluff, I’ll tune to one of the 739 available outlets already in place for it.

One more thing. Having a baby should NOT make you fireproof no matter what business you’re in. A business exists to make money. If an employee cannot contribute to that because they’re gone for months at a critical time or frequently missing because of sick kids, see ya.

By: Peterr

Peterr — Tue, 23 May 2006 20:07:20 +0000

Far be it from me to be a shill for corporate bosses, but another way of looking at this is to take ABC at its word, when they said Ms. Vargas asked for the shift.

The logic of such a request is fairly straightforward. As part of an anchoring duo, she might have had a plan for handling not just maternity leave but also the ongoing parenting duties. With her co-anchor out of the picture, could it be that she felt that the flexibility of 20/20 would make juggling the job-parent combination easier?

If this is the case, I’d love to hear it from Ms. Vargas herself – perhaps a news segment on parents finding ways to handle both work and parenting duties. On the other hand, if it’s NOT the case, then Go Andrew!