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Being a woman is sports media is difficult. I only deal with a fraction of it since I cover sports part time and I’m not on air anymore.
Of course, you’re held to a higher standard than your male counterparts and readers (even female ones) are overeager to point out the slightest error. Than there are the micro aggressions from colleagues.
Like the one guy who walks into me every time I’m covering a story, refusing to acknowledge I exist and showing me less decency than an inanimate object.
Or when I get credential checked every 5 feet while groups of men easily walk by. Or being told I can’t stand somewhere and when I move, a male reporter quickly takes me place and is left alone.
I keep thinking about the time I didn’t know I’d be covering Browns camp and I was wearing a dress, which everyone had to comment on. It was probably the last time I wore a dress to work.
Then, there’s when I get introduced to someone while out on a story: “This is the web girl.” I don’t get a name or a title. It shows so much disrespect for me and my job. Because I’m not a 35-year-old woman with more than a decade of experience covering the city’s biggest stories
These are forms of harassment. Yes, working in news requires thick skin. But no one should be made to feel uncomfortable while doing their job.
So yeah, reading the Mickey Callaway story and the following reactions hit a nerve with me. As it probably did for any woman who’s ever set foot in a professional sports locker room.
