1. #MGHangout
Why a women’s site?

8. Anne Taylor commented on a Grubstreet story
regarding the M&G women’s site saying:
“Let me just recall the Media Monitoring’s Gender
Baseline study (back in 2000 or so), which showed
“the level of women speaking in the media is still
way below 50%. When women do speak, their roles
are often limited to victims, family of somebody or
when they are celebrities. Professional people,
when quoted, on the other hand are almost all
men.”
Does having a women’s section change this? Does it
put women’s voices into front-page stories? Does
it? Just asking…”

9. Thoughtleader blogger Talia Meer wrote a piece earlier
this year saying:
“While this seems like a fairly benign prospect, the
beginnings of what sounds like an M&G online
version of Huisgenoot is indicative of how we see
women in society ... That is not to say women
should not be able to articulate their own issues, or
create spaces within which to do this. But that all
people should be compelled to listen to these
grievances, they should be part of a serious and
transformative national dialogue, and they should
not be relegated to the periphery of mainstream
media, or framed as ‘lifestyle’ issues.”

12. Gillian McAinsh, editor of the women’s section of The
Herald newspaper also wrote on GrubStreet
“It is not about dumbing down, sunshine
journalism or sexism but as including a lighter
lifestyle mix – including fun stuff – as well as the
hard news on Page 1. It has always been
needed, it always will be. We wordsmiths and
gender activists may care what this section is
labelled but very few in the world at large do,”
she writes.