Mastracci's journalism list provokes anger: Do You Have to Remind People We’re the Establishment?
Davide Mastracci speaking on CTV.
Written by: Adam Riggio
There is a curious little project online at Read Passage: it’s an open list of all the journalists in Canadian media who are related by family ties.
At first, it just seems like one more example of the Canadian media’s trademark insular nerdiness, where a Canadian media outlet talks about the nature of Canadian media. Surely, a topic so small must not be so important, especially given the coup attempt against the US government led by white supremacist militias, or that Canada’s COVID-19 vaccination program is moving at a glacial pace as the pandemic continues to slaughter and permanently disable thousands every day.
But the publication of this organized list, and the hissy-fits that followed, mean something more profound than the insecurities of a few journalists who fear they may have built their prestige on light nepotism instead of reasonable merit. The fact that someone could make such a list, and that the list would touch nearly every inch of Canada’s news media, is a sign that the platforms we rely on for our news of the country and the world are too insular to give us the full truth of a complex world.
So What Was the T on Mastracci?
Passage Managing Editor Davide Mastracci’s public list of inherited news media rolodexes provoked some journalists to take issue with the list, and accuse him of making veiled accusations of outright nepotism or implying incompetence. Some examples follow.
Chief film critic at the National Post Chris Knight wrote “What is the point? You list the things you're NOT implying, so what ARE you implying? And what does this ‘missing’ data say? Do we also need a list of devilishly handsome critics, say, or left-handed reporters?”
The CBC’s Emily Senger was also incredulous that anyone would think it mattered that the children of journalists would also become journalists: “Is it so weird that kids going into the same business as their parents?”
However, if social platform chatter is our measure of how provocative Mastracci’s list was among Canadian media, it did not land much impact. Most of the journalists and columnists Mastracci included in his guide to le famiglie giornalistiche shrugged it off or never mentioned it at all. The most notorious inheritance in Canadian media (at least beyond the owners of our country’s media outlets), Barbara and her son Jon Kay, said nothing on the day of the list’s release, perhaps considering themselves above this mere squabbling among the less-connected rabble.
Emma Teitel actually gave Mastracci some post-publication edits to correct a couple of errors about her family in the list, including that Canadaland founder and chief Jesse Brown is a first cousin of hers. Brown himself, despite being a member of a multiple-journalist family, considered the list important. So did climate journalist David Gray-Donald in replies to Senger and Teitel. In a typically amusing social media moment, Teitel’s mother also considers it useful to know which voices in the media have been grandfathered (or even great-grandfathered) into the industry.
A Teapot, or Maybe Even Teacup, Sized Tempest
Despite my assignment to cover the controversy, there was not actually that much controversy over the list. What little anger did appear came in the form of some accusations that Mastracci was hiding an intention to discredit the work of journalists in Canada’s journalistic families.
National Observer climate reporter Emma McIntosh, included on the list as the daughter of investigative reporter Andrew McIntosh, wrote “Oh good, some guy has decided to imply that I only got a job in journalism because of who my dad is and didn't bother asking me for comment.” Toronto Star politics reporter Alex Boutilier offered some sarcasm in support.
McIntosh was able to score bylines at top tier newspapers with national reach, the Toronto Star and Calgary Herald, while still completing her undergraduate degree. While her work being accepted for publication was a sign of its quality and her genuine talent, those without the professional network of her father find it much more difficult to stand out among a crowd of regular freelance pitches.
Nonetheless, McIntosh directly engaged Mastracci, accusing him of assembling the list in bad faith. “Hey, I saw your little disclaimer, but by painting all of us with the same brush as the Kays, you're making a lot of implications and I think that's really obvious. Also, it's irresponsible "journalism" to publish w/o context or asking for comment. Again, obvious.”
Emily Mathieu, a fourth-generation Canadian journalist, retweeted a Toronto Star article about the self-entitlement of political leaders disappearing for weeks on vacation in the middle of pandemic lockdowns, shortly before retweeting McIntosh’s complaint. Brennan Doherty of The Future Is Good also joined the sarcasm, tweeting “Reaching out to your subjects always helps. Just FYI.”
The Perennial Awkwardness of Canadian Media’s Small Town
However, I don’t want this piece to read entirely like a tawdry Buzzfeed gossip column, nor do I want to pre-emptively burn a bunch of bridges in Canadian media. My whole point in writing this, besides running up our pageview numbers among progressive media dorks, is to show how easily just a little social media grumbling can throw off readers from the main point in compiling this list in the first place.
All it takes is a few half-prominent growly tweets from a few visible people to distract the commentariat. Folks in my position end up writing about how upset some journalists are that someone is calling attention to their well-connected parents who introduced them into the industry. So we think about the list as calling out media industry nepotism.
But nepotism isn’t the point. Actually demonstrating nepotism takes a lot more than simply listing the many familial ties in Canada’s media sector. There are plenty of examples of well-connected children of the already-successful easily gaining prestigious jobs in their family’s industry and failing miserably.
When I asked for her comment, Emma McIntosh offered a clear account of where she thought Mastracci’s list falls short of its purpose. “It’s completely fair to look at dynastic families in journalism, and the fact that this issue is interconnected with class and race.
“My issue with the article was the lack of context and the disingenuous way the author went about it,” said McIntosh. “The header image is a gaggle of old white guys sitting on a bench — how would a reader not infer that the list is about an old boys club? And if that’s the point, why not just say so, approach it in good faith, ask people for comment and actually get into the issue?
“It doesn’t do the work of explaining how these connections actually contribute to a lack of diversity in Canadian media,” she continued.
Why It Matters Where Our Journalists Come From
No matter the industry, having parents or other family in that industry makes it easier for you to enter. You have intimate access to someone with a career’s professional network, which is just one way those family ties leverage entry into journalism. But what remains to be done is to investigate the many different ways that younger journalists from families at risk of becoming a dynasty can exercise that leverage. Or how they fail in that exercise. Or how they walk away from it into another sector.
We in Canadian media who want the diversity of our journalistic voices to reflect the real diversity of the country must marshal more resources and effort to understand the size and profundity of its dynastic influences. A list such as Mastracci’s must be supplemented with commentary from experts and members of multi-generation journalism families. Quantitative research can discover more about the social composition of Canadian media, the composition of student bodies in journalism schools, the rates at which different groups move from journalism schools into successful media careers, and alternative paths to establish journalism careers.
Mastracci’s list is necessary to reckon with the legacy and ongoing practices of discrimination and marginalization in Canadian media, particularly journalism. But it is a beginning for such a reckoning, not the end.
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