The X and Y’s of the Anchor Chair
When both CTV and Global recently announced new female anchors for their flagship newscasts, some began asking when the CBC would consider a woman for the anchor’s, chair, uh, spot, at The National.
Norman Specter lead the charge in the Globe on yesterday:
How embarrassing it must be for the Corporation — centre of all that is “progressive” and a paragon of diversity — that both Ms. Friesen and CTV’s Lisa LaFlamme have broken through the glass ceiling, while [the CBC is] still stuck in a single-X-chromosome world in the anchor chair
This odd ode lead to the CBC’s Senior Washington correspondent Neil Macdonald to respond in a letter to the editor today. Macdonald wrote:
Norman Spector seems to think the CBC should immediately replace Peter on the grounds of his gender, just because the other two anchors are women (TV’s Last Man Standing – July 14). Perhaps that’s Mr. Spector’s background as a government functionary asserting itself, but speaking as a career reporter, I’m encouraged to see Canadian television news maintain a highly visible meritocracy.
Incidentally, I seem to recall Barbara Frum anchoring The Journal and Pam Wallin co-anchoring CBC’s The National. But I am sure Mr. Spector, as an expert commentator on the Canadian media, had some reason for overlooking their accomplishments.
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Mr. Macdonald is not alone in remembering these particularly pesky historical details. I am curious as to Mr. Spector’s reasons for omitting them.
I well remember Jan Tennant anchoring on Global News back in the 80′s, but I don’t recall any big hoopla about it at the time. She was just accepted as a fine on-air journalist doing a good job. That’s the way it should be, as gender shouldn’t be an issue, only competent journalism should count.
For those who wish to make gender an issue, however, I would suggest that CBC has nothing to apologize for, as there seem to be many more female anchors throughout the day on CBC News than males. So why call for a female anchor to immediately replace Peter Mansbridge on “The National” too? Peter is a great journalist and highly respected by his colleagues and longtime viewers. I’m also very impressed with his handling of the long form interview on his “Mansbridge – One on One” show. I actually recorded his interview with Bill Clinton from a couple or so years ago, as it was brilliant and kept the bar raised high, focusing on the policies of the Clinton administration and steering clear of any mention of Monica. You could even see, as the interview progressed, that Clinton himself was impressed with Peter’s integrity and was quite candid with his answers, providing great insight into the years of his presidency. Peter Mansbridge continues to do CBC proud, so there is no need to replace him with a female anchor just to satisfy the ridiculous politically correct types among the critics.
If the maudits tetes carees would pay attention, another national network (Radio-Canada) has has women in the national chair for years, and now it is all week long with Celine Galipeau and Pascale Normandeau.
The private TVA has Sophie Thibault as anchor.
So slow and backward, these English