In Italy, female editor signals women's rise

by Ashley Rosenstein

Women journalists are setting a precedent for Italian women in the workplace. But low female employment remains a problem.

When Concita de Gregorio became the editor in chief of L'Unità, a national newspaper, she said she wanted to focus on politics and daily news: "We have had enough commentary, now we need facts," she wrote in her first editorial on Aug. 26

http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0916/p07s02-woeu.html

I'm suprised by the fact that Italians are so against having a woman in this type of position. I hadn't realized how split the sexes still were in Italy, and never expected such protests in this type of situation. One journalist even responded by saying "I bet now we'll see many easy recipes for working mothers and advice [in the paper] on how to behave like prostitutes when [their] husbands come home."

I also found out that Italy ranks second-lowest among Western European countries, followed by Portugal, in women's rights and social status issues.
The article also stated that "Gregorio's editorship is part of a wider trend of Italian women succeeding in the national media. In 2000, Flavia Perina became the first female editor of the far-right daily Il Secolo d'Italia, and in 2002, Daniela Hamaui became the first woman to head L'Espresso, an investigative news magazine."