In Tuesday’s edition of the Poynter Report, I wrote about Gannett’s much-anticipated hire of a reporter to cover music icon Taylor Swift. The reporter is Bryan West, a 35-year-old former TV producer. I mentioned some of the challenges ahead, such as access to Swift and whether or not West could cover her critically given that he is a big fan.
But I heard from many Poynter Report readers on Tuesday about something I absolutely should have mentioned — that Gannett hired a man to cover a woman whose work often reflects the female experience.
Leanne Potts, an Atlanta-based freelance journalist, wrote to me, “Are you even going to point out the incredible irony of Gannett hiring a male to cover a feminist icon who writes songs about tribulations faced by women?”
Potts added that Gannett is “out of touch” with “their readers and Swift’s fans.” She then quoted a song lyric: “I’m sick of running as fast as I can/Wondering if I’d get there quicker if I was a man.”
“Guess who wrote that?” asked Potts, who then added, “You missed the lede, Tom.”
Potts is absolutely right. I dropped the ball for failing to see that perhaps the biggest issue isn’t that West is a fan of Swift, but that he’s a man.
Ann Handley, another Poynter Report reader, wrote, “In the year of Barbie, Gannett hired a man to cover Taylor Swift? … Read the room, Gannett.”
I received several other emails that said, basically, the same thing.
Meanwhile, the reaction on social media ranged from disappointment to outright anger.
One tweeted, “USA today undermined how much Taylor is girlhood and how much we would hate this. No hate on the dude, but we all know that position was meant for a woman.”
Another tweeted, “I will never stop complaining that an artist who has one of the most unapologetically feminine bodies of work was given a male journalist to write about her full time. We never see this happening in reverse either.”
And another simply tweeted, “They hired a man to cover Taylor Swift. Okay.”
This piece originally appeared in The Poynter Report, our daily newsletter for everyone who cares about the media. Subscribe to The Poynter Report here.
As a father of a 11 year old daughter that has Taylor Swift on repeat in the car and in the house 24/7, I can tell you with great certainty that she is absolutely not a feminist. She can be thought of as such, but her music does not at all reflect this. Even the songs like The Man and others that people regularly point to are incorrectly labeled as such. So when Gannett did they search, which 100% consisted of men and women (and all other genders), get this… they picked the person that was best suited for the job.