Besides fake news, bias and fewer readers, the US media has another problem: the lack of Asian-American representation
- The Asian-American demographic is one of the fastest growing in the US, but its news media is failing to reflect this, which is to the detriment not only of the industry but also society in general
Members of Congress, 2020 presidential candidates, administration officials and other political “experts” are arguing their own perspectives on the impeachment question in nightly broadcasts on CNN and Fox News, and in the editorial pages of The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal.
I am struck not just by the scope of the impeachment coverage, but also by the journalists carrying it out. Nearly all are Caucasian or African-American, while Asian-Americans are noticeably absent from both broadcast and print journalism.
As Asian-Americans represent a growing bloc of the US population, they too have an important role to play in communicating information to the public and should be given opportunities to contribute to the current political dialogue.
My own interest in journalism goes back before my time in the United States. As a high school student in Beijing, I was recruited to write for the North China Daily as a high school reporter from 1946-1949.