Homo Welcome Angela Valdez
Having waded into sophomore year/identity politics/politically correct waters yesterday, with a Slog about an In Other News item that relied on repeated use of the pro-noun “He,” I’m now going to air a similar political discussion that bubbled up in an e-mail exchange I had yesterday. (Oh, and p.s. “He” is the correct usage according to the Chicago Manual of Style that we follow.)
I won’t say whom I was e-mailing with … or what the discussion was about, but at some point in the back and forth, my epistolary pal said: “attractive women are over represented in their newsroom— [but] at the Stranger it’s gay men.”
Tired of the myth that the demographics in the Stranger’s editorial offices tilt “gay male” … I set my friend straight: There are currently 15 staff writers in our editorial department. 9 of them are men (and 4 of those men are gay). 6 staffers are attractive women. Meanwhile, we recently hired a new reporter, Angela Valdez. This means we will have 16 editorial staff writers, and 7 of them will be attractive women. So, in order of representation, we are 44% women, 31% straight men, and 25% gay men.
(Meanwhile, our copy editing staff is 2 attractive women. And our web editor is an attractive woman.)
Given those stats, my e-mail friend replied:” You should put something about that in the paper; I know I’m not the only one operating under that misconception.”
So, for those of you who are operating under that misconception, that’s the breakdown.
You are clearly discriminating the hell against unattractive women. Or just polite!