Women Action and the Media Corporation

Wam is an independent, nonprofit organization that is building a robust, effective, inclusive movement for gender justice in the Media. We are a growing community of people engaged with Media, learning and sharing the capacity and skills needed to build a Media ecosystem that represents the diversity of our lives and stories. Wam realizes our mission through Media advocacy, community engagement, capacity building, research, and leadership development. From the fbrape campaign, to incubating bindercon, to launching our harassstats report about gendered harassment on twitter, there's been a lot of triumphs since wam became an official nonprofit in 2013. In 2014-15, wam transitioned to new executive leadership, engaged in a strategic visioning process, launched a harassstats research report about gendered harassment on twitter, and expanded our nine chapters to montreal, the bay area, and toronto. Since wam launched the pilot and report, twitter has broadened their definition of a threat (so abusers can't game the system), publicly committed to building a more diverse workforce, and allowed users to share block lists to prevent abuse. Moreover, we helped ignite significant global wins in the movement to end online harassment. We also collaborated with vida: Women in literary arts on their first-ever Women of color vida count, convened our annual wam boston film festival, hosted screenings for groundbreaking women-directed films, and shared our direct-action organizing model with a global audience at the united nations. Wam connects and supports Media makers, activists, academics and funders working to advance womens Media participation, ownership and representation. Our work is part of an advocacy movement for gender justice in Media. Since its founding, wam has been leading efforts to build an inclusive Media movement. Our work includes: organizing conferences, workshops and trainings to incubate new ideas for social change; provide tools, education and support to remove barriers to Media access, production, employment and ownership; share information and foster collaborations among individuals and groups; build a Media ecosystem that represents the diversity of our lives and stories. Overseeing an active membership listserv that analyzes media/gender issues and, when needed, formulates a response. Creating global and local (glocal) networks of allies working to confront false and inadequate Media representations of Women and other marginalized groups. Challenging ourselves and each other to address and heal differences and oppressions that can prevent us from working together for mutual justice. Because power and privilege is about who gets to speak and who is listened to. Most of the time, its not Women. Here are just a few numbers were out to change: online Media- Women hold just 5% of clout-level positions in the Media overall, and only 11% of executive positions in silicon valley. Free speech and safety online- a recent pew research study found that fully 25 percent of young Women online have been sexually harassed online and 26 percent have experienced stalking. News - according to journalism.coms annual state of the Media report, in 2008,race and gender issues only accounted for 1% of overall news coverage. Print Media - the 2008 racial and gender report card of the associated press sports editors (apse), which covers and grades 378 associated press newspapers, gave the apse newspapers and web sites a c for racial hiring practices and an f for gender hiring practices; the report card stated that Women account for only 6% of sports editors, 10% of assistant sports editors, 6% of columnists, 9% of reporters and 16% of copy editors/designers (via Media report to Women). Radio - the state of the Media report also states that in 2009, only 19% of radio news directors were Women. From 2003 to 2008, the percentage of female general managers for radio stations has risen from 13.7% to 15.8% only a 2.1% increase in 5 years. the percentage of program directors went up .2%, from 10.7% in 2003 to 10.9% in 2009. Of the top 100 markets, that percentage decreases, with only 10% of programming directors listed as female (up .1% from 2003) (miw radio group). Film - the feminist blog Women & hollywood found that in 2008, only 6 of the top 50 grossing films starred or were focused on Women. Other surprising statistics include that only 25% of production managers, 12% of writers, 9% of directors, 5% of sound designers, and 1% of key grips were Women. the rest of the statistics can be found on the blog and are worth a look, because theyre equally as disturbing. Television - among late-night writers, few Women in the room by bill carter. Published in the new york times on november 11, 2009. Even though Women make up a large portion of late-night talkshow audiences, there are no Women writers for the jay leno show, late show with david letterman, or the tonight show with conan obrien (the article was written before conan left the tonight show). Women only make up about 40% of the total television newsroom staff, according to the state of the Media report, and according to the Media report to Women, 28.3% of news directors are Women. the report also states that this number is an all-time high. the Women & hollywood blog also found statistics that in 2008, Women made up 4% of directors of photography, 9% of directors, and 23% of executive producers of television. Women also only made up only a quarter of all creators, executive producers, producers, directors, writers, editors, and directors of photography for sitcoms, dramas, and reality programs. Representation - Women in peril:a look at tvs disturbing new storyline trend: the parents television council found that since 2004, there has been a 120% increase in depictions of violence against Women on television. An even more disturbing finding was the 400% increase in the depictions of teen girls as the victims of violence. A study done by san diego state university in 2007-2008 that said that most female characters were significantly younger than male characters. Male characters accounted for 70% of characters in their 50s and 61% of characters in their 60s; similarly, 21% of all characters were males over 40, while only 11% of characters were Women over 40 (via Media report to Women). the gay and lesbian alliance against defamation (gladd)s annual report on diversity says that in the 2009-2010 television season, there were/will be 18 lgbt characters (out of 600 total series regulars), which is an all time high. the report also found that 57% of all characters are male (345 male vs 255 female), and 77% (466) of characters are white. Beauty and body image in the Media: twenty years ago, the average model weighed only 8% less than the average woman, but todays models weigh an average of 23% less.