I looked up Omar Sachedina online, to find out we’re the same age. In the same field. The only differences are that I’m freelance, and a woman. I’ll deal with the part about being a woman later.

The age; 39 about to be 40. The same age as older Millennials. If an appeal to this demographic is at the core of the decision to fire Ms. LaFlamme, then it’s a weak argument there at best. The other part of age, is at 40 he’s reaching what is the pinnacle of journalism- hosting an 11pm national nightly newscast. Only three of those exist in Canada. There’s little challenge left after you take that. And there’s probably about 20, maybe 30 years left to work. If you reach that post at 40, what’s left?

Now the “being a woman” part of it. I’ve been in the business 13 years. When I started out in 2009, I had a male editor, and a male publisher. I wore heels to scrums just so press secretaries would call on me. I was often the only female reporter for the first couple of years. On any given day at my second position there might have been two or three women in the office, including me. The last few years, it has improved. Prior to COVID, I covered Town Hall, and at one point there were three female reporters; one more than female councilors. Representation is improving.

I work in online/ print media, an area where you can get away with looking clean, and presentable when showing up to an event. There’s less of an emphasis on appearance, and age. It’s a different story for television news; the emphasis on appearance was an instant turnoff for me at J-school, and I made the conscious decision not be an on-air television reporter. So a woman who allowed her hair to go grey on television, and relied on her talent earned my respect. Aging women, or overweight women, or women with any kind of flaw are frowned upon on television. And LaFlamme’s dismissal shows nothing has changed in that regard.

I have read about a couple of items about her dismissal posted yesterday by Canadaland, and this morning from Brian Lilley, telling slightly different stories. It was budget motivated, or related to misogyny (Canadaland). It was related to a toxic workplace, or a story she’d helped produce on Patrick Brown (Brian Lilley) that became the subject of a lawsuit. Regardless, LaFlamme pulled in 1.2 million viewers per night, a pretty rare feat in Canadian television. The coverage on both Afghanistan, and Ukraine was excellent- you need to go to these places to d. The Indigenous Circle feature was an important adoption as it gave a voice to First Nations’ people, while helping Canadians learn more about our country’s history. It makes it pretty hard to swallow that it was a business decision. There’s not enough specifics in Lilley’s story to put much stock in the picture he paints of LaFlamme as a diva.

What I worry about the most is what this story says to women in journalism. For me it raises the concern, that the higher I go in this industry, the more likely I’m fired, because I’m a woman who speaks her mind. It says that my career has an end-date, that I have no say in. That’s a terrible situation for women to be in. And it says that no matter how far we’ve progressed in the cause of equality, we’ve still got a heck of a long way to go. For younger journalists, and those hoping to enter the profession it says there is no hope of job security, or loyalty in the industry.