Mobridge Tribune

Popular Categories

No categories found.

KATIE ZERR: We can depend on Fox to remind us why


In the past 100 years, women in the world have made advances in nearly every cultural. Women have made small steps in some cultures such as being allowed to attend school, to huge steps such as working their way into the top positions of worldwide conglomerates in others.

In the United States, women are leaders in governments, CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, researchers developing cures for disease, groundbreaking scientists and much more.

Respect for what women have accomplished, in and out of the home, has been a difficult hurdle for some to get over even in 2014.

There are still those who think a woman needs to be reminded of her place, no matter what she has accomplished.

A perfect example of that occurred recently at a news conference with Russian Cosmonaut Yelena Serova. She is the first Russian woman to go to the International Space Station and only the fourth Russian woman in history to enter space.

She was being interviewed by the Russian press with two of her male colleagues before lift-off when disrespect reared its ugly head.

One reporter asked how she planned to do her hair and make-up in the craft.

“Can I ask a question, too?” she replied. “Aren’t you interested in the hairstyles of my colleagues?”

But the reporters were not deterred from their mission to find out just how Serova would cope with choosing what to pack and whether she would be taking makeup with her on the flight.

But that is Russia. We are much more advanced. We would never disrespect a woman who has accomplished so much in this country. In this country we fight disrespect every day and are far above others.

Unfortunatly that is a false statement. In fact, in one of the most incredibly disgusting displays witnessed in a public forum, the boys at FOX News topped the disrespect meter, climbing over top of the Russian reporters as if they were a step ladder.

After rousing segment bashing President Obama for the manner in which he disrespected the military with his “latte salute,” the FOX boys showed that disrespecting females in the military is just what boys do.

As the one of the female reporters on FOX Five program hailed the first female pilot from the United Arab Emirates, who led the first mission into Syria and dropped the bombs on ISIS on Monday night, her male colleagues just couldn’t help themselves. The disrespectful, sexist remarks flowed naturally as they entertained each other.

The first remark was that she would have trouble parking the jet once she was on the ground. Then one asked the other “Would that be considered ‘boobs on the ground’ or no?”

Wasn’t this the same group who trashed the president for disrespecting the military with an absent minded salute? Isn’t this the group that minutes earlier in the program had said the president should show some respect for the people who put their lives on the line for us?

The hypocrisy, which runs rampant on national news channels, especially on Fox, was never more evident than in that moment.

The female on the panel groaned and covered her face, saying the men just had to step on her moment. Instead of standing up to the Neanderthals, putting them in their place and calling them out for their stupidity and sophomoric humor, she simply shook her head at their antics.

Others on the network were not quite as kind, chastising them for their behavior, but those good ole boys still have their jobs.

If they had pulled that in the boardroom or in other professional settings, they would more than likely have been packing their bags or facing a lawsuit.

Others have been calling them out for their utter hypocrisy, but it will not make a difference at Fox. One can’t imagine them having to go through sensitivity training there. It would take the edge off of their “reporting” skills.

As women continue to make less money than men in the same jobs, continue to have to answer to the ignorance of others, have to fight for the same rights given to men in a similar position, and have to be considerably better than the men at their jobs to garner promotions, we can depend on the boys at Fox News to remind why we continue to do so.

 

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *