One of the biggest duties a journalist (freelance, mainstream or otherwise) has to fulfil is to the people around him.
You could be meeting the needs of that woman you’re crushing on, your colleagues or business partners, or your entire country.
Human beings influence each other's attitudes, perceptions, and opinions about situations and even manner of relationships, either individually or corporately.
A community's global view is, therefore, an outcome of such influences.
In modern society, the media is well placed to exert such influence that what we see, hear, and read in the media and finally imbibe into our belief system is a reflection of the selected priorities and views of the media and how they report certain.
The selection and its style of presentation reproduce certain stereotype assumptions about women's roles and status in society that affect the way they are portrayed and reported in the media.
Kenya’s media landscape has greatly transformed since the reforms of the 1990s, resulting in increased private ownership of media among other changes in the media panorama.
The relationship between the media, politics and the citizen has been the most affected by these transformations, which now leads to that sticky situation of women being under-represented in all spheres of influence in life.
While news of women breaking boundaries and barriers in society has been on the rise, it has become a realisation of today and not as commonplace as it was years ago.
The frenzy for instance that surrounded the appointment of Martha Koome as Kenya’s first female Chief Justice was rampant, but many other women were pacesetters years ago but have sadly been ignored by the media.
According to the agenda setting theory, the media influences people not so much regarding what they think but about what they think about.
In this way, the media is responsible for the pictures they distribute in the eyes of their audiences or consumers.
Using examples from the general elections, it is correct to say that media reporting and language consciousness used while describing women, in this case: Martha Karua, was thrown out of the window by some news outlets.
Karua, who has been in politics for over 30 years, was constantly referred to as the ‘Iron Lady’.
According to the media, the term was motivated by how the international media used to refer to current German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
A soviet journalist coined the term, iron lady to describe the first British woman Prime Minister Margret Thatcher.
It is frequently used for women in government who are often deemed ruthless or relentless.
However, Karua, in a recent interview with CNN, said she deemed and downplayed the term as misogynistic and that she loathes the nickname.
Karua said the fact that she had to be branded as the iron lady was evident to the level of patriarchy in the Kenyan society, that it had to define her as different from what a woman has been perceived to be, just because of her show of strength.
Above all, like many women politicians, she was fairly represented in the media contrasts with her male counterparts who were hopeful for various political seats.
By the foregoing, it is evident that women both in leadership and not are often disadvantaged by how the media frames the narrative on their engagement with the public.
Many are curious for instance how the media will report on matters such as Nakuru having an all-female leadership from governor to MCA, the first time the country has ever witnessed something such as this.
Kenya was narrowly close to having its first-ever female deputy-president elect, but that was floored by William Ruto and co- the outgoing deputy president being the first in Kenya’s history to succeed his boss.
It was almost a repeat of the 2016 US general elections where Hilary Clinton was very close to clinching the most powerful seat in the world before Trump happened.
Going forward, there will be more women setting new heights and defying societal norms and it is thus upon the media to familiarise themselves with reporting on matters women, especially the media houses which pull some of the country’s most significant traffic (we call it eyeballs).
Gender training is thus necessary so that journalists know how to write stories on women without portraying them negatively.
Journalists are taught news writing, libel laws, and ethics in journalism among others, media training institutions in the country should include gender training in their curriculum.
For those already at work, newsrooms should organise short-term courses and seminars on gender-sensitive reporting for reporters, editors, and those working in the marketing and advertising departments.
Such training should focus on language use, advertising, photography, cartoons, and news content that portray women more positively.
Moreover, an editorial policy in media organisations to guide against the negative portrayal of women by ensuring objectivity and gender sensitivity in language and picture use should be included.
For now, the dream of Kenya having its first female deputy president is still hanging on to being a reality, now that the coalition has filed a petition at the Supreme Court to invalidate the results of the just-concluded elections.
Chege is the founder and managing editor at Viral Tea Ke and Ngari is a student at Rongo University.
Edited by Kiilu Damaris
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