Diversity is sexy

So an online journalist poses the question.

Do you find Asian men sexy?

Three American blond white women answer, no.

A conversation is triggered citing media portrayal of Asian men as nerdy or foreign being to blame.

A touch of the sinister

However, I think this problem runs deeper.

Posing a question based on whether a certain race is sexy is a little racist.

It presumes an answer that discards men based on their race.

Thus in asking the question you are perpetuating a reality where it is considered normal to discard a man on something as shallow as skin colour.

Media beige

Agreed it probably does not help that the media landscape favours white men for their heroes, but if the journalists holding it to account do not challenge their subject on their prejudices then little progress is made.

Although in asking the question they have at least illustrated just how far we still need to go.

One race is not more or less sexy, you are just closing down your options to a lot of truly beautiful people.

Come on, if when he was young Bruce Lee propositioned you are you really telling me you would turn down this fit and driven young man.

I am not saying white men are any less sexy than their Asian counterparts, but I am saying they are really no more.

Too thin by half

Numbers admitted to anorexia clinics has gone up in Britain in the last 10 year's as reported by The Guardian.

The articles cites celebrity images in magazines as being part of the culprit.

I do not know enough to assume the exact triggers for eating disorders, but idealised standards for women are unlikely to help, based purely on common sense.

All women have the capacity to be beautiful and it would be great if the media could move closer to reflecting this fact.

Cosmopolitan in the UK did some great images recently shooting pregnant women of varying races and body types and they all looked great.

Could we present more of this?

Doves advertising in the UK has been interesting, it has made the bold move of focusing on women's beauty rather than their flaws to sell things; the better course I believe.

The struggling local press

I was searching for an outlet for an article that I am trying to write on a local issue.

Only to be confronted with precious few outlets for such articles and a writing team on some of these papers that clearly consists of about three people.

Now, I know what that feels like to a degree having worked for a student news team of three, but that was only producing a paper about once every four weeks - my memory of these facts is now hazy.

It was an intimate experience and one which served to make me some friends who I admire to this day large numbers of who work in the media and publishing in some capacity.

It wasn't the best way of serving a community though really.

Journalism is best when you can get out to see people and that isn't always going to be possible if there aren't many of you and you rarely take on freelancers.

If this isn't a pitch for a job I don't know what is, but I'm actually trying to draw your attention to a wider problem hard working journalists with integrity who are being asked to do more and more for less, something worth remembering when Andy Coulson's name is being splashed all over the place.

It's unsurprising one of the unions for those media workers was out on strike recently.

I have a dream

 I feel this is a more fitting tribute to Maya Angelou than I could muster in a discussion of her poetry.