USA Today founder Al Neuharth died last week, and his passing made the top of the front page of his newspaper today (4/22/13).
Seeing him above the fold can only recall a rather famous story about Neuharth’s outburst at a 1983 USA Today editorial meeting. The story seems to have been first told in Peter Prichard’s book The Making of McPaper:
In the window of the newsrack in the conference room, the smiling face of a leaping cheerleader was above the fold–the top half of page one. After all of the editors were seated, Neuharth strode over to the newsrack. He opened the door and then slammed it violently. He did that again and again, banging the door against the rack.
The assembled editors stared, wide-eyed. He had their attention now. “When you run a picture of a clean-cut, all-American girl like this,” Neuharth announced, “get her tits above the fold.”
It may appear a sexist comment at first glance, but to me it appears to be a simple marketing ploy. Sex sells. If you have a picture of a beautiful woman on the cover, be sure to sell the sex of the photo. It is amazing how simple business can appear to be sexist when it is simply doing the job. If you wish to call him sexist, show me the times he promoted a man for a job that a woman was more highly qualified for. Show me the times this man tried to handle the bodies of his female staff. This comment is marketing. I don’t see it as anything more.
That anecdote tells it all. USA Today has very little to tell us about journalism but has a lot to say regarding the state of exploitative marketing in the US.
Classy guy. He said ironically.
Women objectified for marketing. Doesn’t change the sexism in it or its total intent.
So this is the news I need to know? 30 years ago some guy said something sexist. Ding dong, a sexist man is dead.
Kelly, so long as sex is USED to sell, it WILL BE a sexist problem, one that FEEDS whatever sexism already exists. It’s a chicken-egg situation.
So long as marketers can succeed in telling us — as you just did — that sexism in the interest of profits is just fine, then By-God we will HAVE sexism in the interest of profits, and EVERY published picture of a woman will be reflexively evaluated on the criteria you mention — her facial attractiveness, and whether or not we got a good glimpse of her sexy zones…
Boy Lincoln sure was a jerk for not adding suffrage on to the 13th ammendment. you certainly can’t judge someone by the time period they are from.
And anyone who finds one person more attractive than another better not choose to look at the more attractive person longer. But since a lot of people do that, we better stop publishers from putting ANY pictures of people on anything that contains advertising.
Of course there are some societies who have tried to solve this problem by mandating women cover up. But this is AMERICA, so lets apply that to men and women so it is fair. there. sexism solved. now lets talk about something easier like peace in the middle east.
Well now that we have had one tenth of an out of context,whisper around the room ,non confirmed,bit of gossip can we get on with the editorials?
If Al had said to lower the photo to get her hair in, would that have been “hairism”?