Committed to fair gender portrayal
within and outside the media, South Asian Women in Media (SAWM) Sri Lanka, mark
International Women’s Day 2016 with a
call for journalists to stand up for gender equality and make fair gender
portrayal a professional and ethical aspiration, similar to respect for
accuracy, fairness and honesty.
One of the greatest challenges we face
as journalists, is to resist the culture of casual stereotype in our everyday
work. There are fixed images, deeply entrenched prejudices and biased reflexes
that pose challenges to journalists and the media. If we are to truly ‘Step It
Up for Gender Equality’ as the Day has been themed by the UN, we have to
confront these biases and prejudices in our newsrooms, and promote gender
equality, both within the working environment and in the representation of
women.
There is an urgent need for a discourse
to highlight the issue of fair gender portrayal in the news agenda, and SAWM
will, as part of its International Women’s Day activities, initiate this
discourse by taking a critical look at
how the media tackles the issue of Sri Lankan’s migrant labour.
The issue is of great significance as 49
% of the 1.8 million Sri Lankans, or 1/10th of the population, who work
international migrant workers are women, the majority of them unskilled. Yet,
there is no reportage through a feminist or gender lens.
Women journalists themselves have
covered women migrants in an event-based manner, despite their economic
contribution. There has been no discussion on the recently introduced
protectionist policies that restrict women from their right to migrant and have
a livelihood. The portrayal of these women has been among the worst, shown as
weak, poor, victimised and vulnerable.
SAWM will in the coming weeks hold a
workshop to orient a select number of women journalists, working in all three
languages, on reporting on this vital issue, breaking the current stereotypes, looking
through the gender lens at policy and practice and at the women who line the
Sri Lankan economy.
