Newspapers faulted for sports hirings

Anyone wonder if we'll be reading this stuff when Mexicans become the majority in this country?

You wond

 

While it's likely that whites in general and white males are "over-represented" in the sportswriting universe, there is also data to suggest that black males are "over-represented" in the pool -- even at the seemingly paltry 5 percent figure that the Lapchick study decries. How, you ask?
According to the U.S. Census Bureau's estimates from July 1, 2007:
Black males represent 3.12 percent of all Americans 25 and over with a Bachelor's degree or higher and 3.32 percent of all Americans with a Bachelor's degree only.

http://www.census.gov/popest/national/asrh/NC-EST2007-asrh.html
http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/education/cps2007.html


Here's the source of my math:
Estimated # of Americans 25+ with a Bachelor's or higher: 55,842,000
Estimated # of black males 25+ with a Bachelor's or higher: 1,743,000

Estimated # of Americans 25+ with a Bachelor's only: 36,658,000
Estimated # of black males 25+ with a Bachelor's only: 1,216,000

Feel free to critique my math and reasoning. I'm not making a declaration here. Just throwing out a possibility.

 

Maybe no one has said it on this thread, because they're faced with statistics exposing this idea that minorities and women are taking all the jobs to be bullshit. But there have been many threads on this board in which people have essentially said that if you're a white male trying to get into or get ahead in this business, you're pretty much screwed because all anybody wants to do is hire women and minorities. People can backpedal away from that idea now all they want, but let's not pretend that it was never put forth.

 

Several years ago, I (a white male) applied for a full-time position in the family department of a daily paper. I was told by the female family editor that I probably wouldn't be hired because I wasn't female and she didn't think I could write a story on social gathering as well as a female reporter.
I didn't get the job, and she's not at that paper any more, but her position was filled by another -- qualified -- woman.

 

My newspaper is currently going through a hiring process and we have gotten some resumes from females. Problem is, none of them have any previous experience in the field. Of the four that have applied to the associate sports editor's position on a two-person staff, one has a journalism degree and no experience with layout and design (which is a requirement). She also has been out of school for 8 years and doesn't have any samples to send. Another has a degree, but not journalism and has never worked in the newspaper industry. She wanted a fresh start at a new company. Another is a die-hard sports fan and just has a high school diploma. She said she is willing to learn on the job how to write for a newspaper and how to do layout and design. Her special skills also listed that she knew how to operate a forklift. Not sure how that qualified her for the job. The fourth (which I find the funniest of all) actually put on her resume that she was applying for a position in customer service saying she is great with people.

I'm not going to hire somebody just because they're either a minority or a woman. I want the best person for the job. If it's a white male, then it's a white male. I don't discriminate. I just want the best person for the job, which has seemed to escape many employers minds because they have to be politically correct in hiring a certain percentage of minorities. The best person should get the job, plain and simple.

 

Who are these employers?

What I've noticed is that the posters who continue to make these suggestions do so with the complete absence of confronting the numbers associated with this study.

 

To be as simple as possible here ... no numbers, no anecdotal evidence, nothing ... I just don't think that this can be our top priority at this time, with the other things on the table, like keeping newspapers solvent and somehow ensuring we're going to make it to 62 without bagging groceries.

 

I haven't seen that in this thread honestly. And my point is that the constant amplifying of those instances should be reflected in the altering of the percentage of white male sportswriters in the industry. Is that train of thought some sort of crime on my part, puzzled that this growing problem as repeated and sighted in this thread hasn't put a dent in the numbers of white males sportwriters in the industry? To me, the delusion carried in here by some is that these occurrences represent some on going trend in an industry whose only trend is that the percentage of white male sportswriters in the industry remain unblemished.

I can't help but to think that some of these guys are taking isolated incidents and running off with it with the fervor of Al Sharpton.

I think that's been my point.

No question it is. But don't give isolated incidents the same gravity as issues showing a widespread and consistent pattern. The incidents sited here are far and few between, if they weren't, it would be reflected in the numbers some are allergic to confront.

And my point is there aren't that many minorities and female candidates in the pool in the first place, and the token few hurt by their hirings seems to be the primary focus to some who refuse to glare at the quantifiable trend that's out there, most sportswriters are white and male, something that has gone relatively unchanged in over 30 years.

 

You are lying!

You have to be, newspapers these days don't hire, they lay-off and fire.......

 

I'm going there, and I already know I'm gonna get slammed for this, but I cannot help myself.

I don't believe in hiring just to reach quotas. Do I think more minorities, including women, should get in the business and be looked at seriously based on their qualifications - absofrigginlutely.
But when a new job opens up at a paper that I would like to be at, and I don't even bother to apply because it's already been sent through the grapevine that they are only hiring a minority, it's discouraging. Especially with the current situation we are all living through in this business. Why should I or any other person be held back from improving our careers, after putting in 10 years of hard work so we could eventually move up just to be denied because we are white men?
They wonder why I want out of the business? It has nothing to do with management problems or how sucky the job has become. It has everything to do with the lack of upward mobility nowadays. Everybody's hanging on to whatever job they have, and when people do leave they want to fill the spots - if they do - with minorities only.
I sound bitter I know. But after being a "finalist" for a couple gigs I really wanted and then to find out later they were hiring just minorities and I was out from the start even though they supposedly loved my work. I don't know what else to do.

 

Newspapers are more intergrated now, both in staff and in coverage,compared to 40 years ago. Read some old papers. The only time a black person would make the paper back then would be if they committed a crime.

It's like Major League Baseball and the Negro Leagues. Once MLB started integration, the need for the Negro Leagues faded, and eventually died out.

 

Well when your newspaper has a two-person sports staff and one gets fired, you still have to hire somebody else. It's a small town, so we're not too bad off financially.