Sally Quinn, CBS anchorwoman says
You’ve got to have self-confidence. If I didn’t
have an enormous amount of self-confidence, I
would have been destroyed by this whole
experience…You can’t learn to be a perfect
anchorwoman in one day, and I knew that I wasn’t
going to be perfect and that people were just
going to crucify me because I wasn’t perfect”
(Gelfman 1976, p. 75).
Michael Gartner, NBC News president, explains what is
important in television news anchoring. “You have to have
a special combination of person to be the focal point of a
successful show. You have to be a good journalist, and
you have to be able to deliver the message-which a print
person doesn’t have to do-in person, in somebody’s house”
(Fensch: Zoglin 1993, p. 281).
Barbara Walters is an exception to the rule that
older women do not succeed in television news. She is a
successful television newswoman who is well over the age
of 40. Even she had to take the hard road to make it to
the top, starting out as a secretary at a small
advertising agency, working in public relations and then
in public affairs for CBS. Walters recognizes the tough
times women in television news face. She says
You have to work harder. It’s been said before,
but it’s true. You are taken less seriously and
you are very often scorned by your own co-workers
…it’s a tougher job for a woman because a woman
has to be awfully good. She really does. A man
can be much more excused” (Gelfman 1976, p. 88).
Women are not rising to the top quickly in television
news, although there is slow improvement, and anchormen
say they are fine with the idea of women at the top.
Walter Cronkite says of a woman anchor in the future,
“Fine, why not? I think it likely…I think by the time
the next change comes, the next generation of anchor
people, I would think that the barrier would be down and
that women would have as good a chance as men” (Sanders
and Rock 1988, p. 198).
Yet there are still roadblocks standing in the way of
women striving to make it to the top. They begin at
low-level jobs, such as researchers and logistics persons
and hope to take the right paths to get to the top of the
ladder. Sanders writes, “For years there were few women
above the level of researcher. While that has changed,
the amount of frustration for those who do not move ahead
has driven many people out of the business altogether”
(Sanders and Rock 1988, p. 198-199).
Lesley Stahl of CBS News points out that anchorwomen
are most often workaholics, with a never-ending drive to
do their job. She says
It’s one reason we do succeed in this business.
We just give it everything…Maybe it’s because
our kind of personalities are attracted to this
industry, compulsive, deadline-oriented people
who keep pushing ourselves to see how much work
we can do. We love work…It’s not just a symptom
in the early stage, it goes on” (Sanders and Rock
1988, p. 81).
Society’s expectations of female news anchors is very
much like that of any woman in a powerful and successful
career. While the women must portray a glamorous, yet
friendly image, expectations of men in the business are
not near as high. Jon Katz says in his article
The men who anchor today look, dress, and act
almost precisely the same way they did 50 years
ago. They only have to reflect a single trait
to succeed-gravitas. They wouldn’t dream of
being intimate, glamorous, or coy. Nor would
anyone expect that of them” (Katz 1995, p. 162).
Katz goes on to say that men who make it in the
business usually never fail. He says of anchormen, “Old
anchors never fade away. And they can’t be killed by
mortal means” (Katz 1995, p. 164).
Sadly, forward movements aren’t apparent today by
women in television news. Forty years ago, a female
gaining the anchor position on the evening news was a leap
forward. Today “it feels more like a step backward, an
attempt to stuff accomplished, contemporary women into an
ill-fitting straightjacket” (Katz 1995, p. 164).
It is apparent that women news anchors face many more
struggles than men in the field. It takes a unique
individual to fight through those struggles and strive for
what they want most: to relay news throughout the world.
Equality with men is far from being reached, but a few
females have stood their ground and hopefully made a
difference for others that follow. If people open their
eyes and realize there are plenty of women who are just
as, if not more, competent than men at holding an anchor
position, women could gain respect within the field. For
now, the few women who find success and are willing to
endure the hardships that come along will likely survive
in the business, at least until age hinders their physical
appearance.