Level up! Women ascending the Australian mediascape
Four journalists had a room of people captivated as they discussed the biggest topics facing women and men during the ‘Power Shifts: Identity, diversity, #metoo’ panel at Storyology 2018.
Catherine Fox, Rachel Hancock and Bri Lee, along with Cathie Schnitzerling as moderator, considered the ways in which women come together to fight for justice.
Bri Lee felt the Not Now, Not Ever report by Quentin Bryce should be the model for a review of gender inequality and sexual assault reports across Australia.
“The reason that was so incredible is she went from the beginning, from that triage stage, the first consultation, right through to courts and legislation she reviewed and made 144 recommendations. And of those, 140-something have been enacted,” Bri said.
Rachel Hancock feels some women don’t promote their female colleagues enough in the workplace.
She described how some women had discouraged her from taking an internship at the New York Post because she had a three-year-old and husband.
She took up the opportunity despite the comments, wishing more women had supported her.
While discussing a sexual harassment case involving Rachel at the Northern Territory News, Catherine Fox said women are now stronger and more situationally aware in the workplace.
“What has shifted, and it is enormously encouraging, is that I think that young women would not do that [any more],” Catherine said.
“Activism by women has changed for us, to take some of the onus off us to prove sexism exists.”
However, Catherine said women are not well represented in the higher positions of many companies, not just in the media.
“I think with the new CEO of Macquarie Bank we got up to 13 or 14 women on the ASX top 200,” she said.
Overall, Catherine recognises there are systemic issues behind the sexism that many women still face.
“Women are just like men, some of them are good and some are bad. I just think women are now stepping forward,” Catherine said.
