Return to Gender: Persistent Byline Gap Prompts Pitching and Moaning (and Partying!)
The streets of Williamsburg saw an unusual uptick in sensible high heels last Tuesday evening, when a couple hundred journalists, writers and editors dressed in summer office casual filed out of the Bedford Avenue station and into the muggy front room of Public Assembly, forming a line out the door. They were there to attend a story-pitching clinic for female journalists, titled, somewhat preciously, “Throw Like a Girl.”
Once inside, they stood shoulder-to-shoulder, sipping beers, while New York Times reporter Amy O’Leary asked a panel of editors and writers to talk about moxie.
Why was it, Ms. O’Leary wondered, that as a young freelancer she had spent months refining every pitch while her male peers tossed off story proposals from every statistic or idea they encountered? Read More
