ASHE SCHOW: Do women journalists get to choose what topics they report?

Female journalists tend to cover education, health, lifestyle and religion, while male journalists tend to cover economics, politics, sports and technology. Is this evidence of discrimination?

The findings come from the Women’s Media Center, which aims to make “women visible and powerful in the media.” It does this through “media advocacy campaigns, media monitoring for sexism, creating original content, training women and girls to participate in media and promoting media experienced women experts,” according to its website.

The Center’s 2015 report, released Thursday, details the lack of women in journalism. The underlying impression is that this is a problem that needs to be remedied in order for women to achieve equality. The entire report appears to imply that discrimination — or the patriarchy — is to blame for there being fewer female journalists. It’s almost like the Science, Technology, Economics and Math argument — that women are being held back due to sexism — but for journalism.

One particularly irksome section claims that “most women wrote about education, health and lifestyle; far fewer females covered economics, politics, sports, tech and other key assignments.” Is this an indication of a problem? Or evidence that women choose to write about different things than men.

Well, plenty of subjects are reserved for women. Men don’t really get to cover sex — unless they’re gay, like Dan Savage. Because straight guys talking about sex is gross and creepy.