Out of all the “illegal immigration” stories that are out there, mostly those on the front pages of major U.S. newspapers, only .2 percent have been written by Latinos. This data was gathered by Fourth Estate for front page stories written from Jan 1st to Oct 12th of this year. Latinos don’t even shared the limelight of front-page reporting in other hot news topics, like foreign policy, with their white, non-Latino colleagues within the 15 major dailies done in the study. But Latinos have scored higher when it came to economic writing, at 1.2 percent. Where does the issue lie? The lack of diversity in the media. granted, one in six people in the US are Hispanic, but that does not show up very much in the media.
Another issue may be the choice of standard words that are used by media outlets. For example, the term “illegal immigrant” that offends about half of the Hispanic population. But is this term really the “standard” in reporting about immigration? If so, newspapers that employ a large amount of Latinos, like the San Francisco Express-News, have dropped the term from their print, as well as Spanish-language papers like El Diario/La Prensa.
And sadly, when it came to picking a moderator for the three presidential debates, not one Latino was considered. In the final debate on foreign policy, moderator Bob Schieffer of ’60 minutes’ didn’t even mention Latin America! Gov. Romney made one small mention of it, but at least it was a positive one.
We all know, based on the 2010 Census records, that the Hispanic population is the fastest growing minority in the US — a majority of the minority. Sure, we see that in public life every day, but what about the media? Let’s remain proud of who we are and be sure that a diverse presence grows in the media.
