There was a time that Newsweek was a respected publication whose coverage of social issues didn't pander and they didn't seem to side with either side of the political spectrum in the United States. This all came to a close as people transitioned away from traditional magazines and headed to the internet, where stories are barely researched at all and are churned out by the hour instead of bi-weekly.
Not wanting to miss out on finding racism in anything and everything, Newsweek did an incredibly dumb article exposing the "TV Star salary gap between white people and people of color."
I hate the People of Color is even a phrase we use now. So blacks are in the same category as Chinese are they? I've met Japanese people who are lighters skinned than I am. It's stupid and the term tries to create an "everyone against white people" setup. It's race-baiting for headlines. Whatever, that's another story, we need to talk about this horrible article by Newsweek.
I want to point out that the article does two things that is completely unfair and goes against anything that any journalism school would teach as far as ethics are concerned: It completely eliminates actors involved in films because if they were to look at that and include Denzel Washington, Will Smith, Samuel Jackson etc, the entire "pay gap" theory goes out the window. They also choose to not include any POC actors that actually do make a lot of money such as "The Rock" but instead pick and choose with ones they are going to focus on.
Those are 2 big sins in journalism: Just picking the data that supports your end result and ignoring all the information that says what you are talking about is completely full of shit.
They focus on two shows in particular: Big Bang and Black-ish and attempt to paint a picture of pay inequality because "they are both similar shows." They are both sitcoms with similar accolades (both get nominated for awards although one might question why one of them is getting nominated) and they have a similar setup in that they are both done on a sound stage with canned laughter. So why is it that the stars of Big Bang (almost entirely white people) are getting paid up to a million dollars an episode while the stars of Black-ish are only getting paid 100,000 per episode?
Well it is racism of course
First off, boo-fucking-hoo on ONLY making $100,000 a week. Secondly, with just a cursory glace at some actual research you will find that Black-ish averages about 2.5 million viewers per episode and has been steadily dropping in popularity over the past 5 years dropping to number 107 in the overall viewership charts. Its numbers are indicative of it likely being cancelled soon.
Big Bang Theory on the other hand steadily GREW it's audience all the way up to more than 20 million viewers per episode and then it tapered off to a paltry 18 million per episode until it's final season. It was ranked in the top 3 shows in America from 2013-2019.
So in conclusion 20 million viewers is a lot more than 2.5 million viewers and being ranked number 1,2,or 3 is a lot better than being ranked 107th. This is why the stars of Big Bang make a million and you make $100,000 over at Black-ish. It has nothing to do with your skin color. You would think the people at Newsweek would understand this and you know what? I think they do understand that and probably are ashamed of themselves for publishing this drivel
I would go into greater detail but I think if you just read the article and you have a lick of sense you will see that their comparisons between shows that are wildly popular such as Modern Family and Big Bang have casts that are justifiably higher-paid than stars of second rate comedies such as Black-ish. For the record I tried to watch an episode of Black-ish (chosen at random)...
It is not funny and is probably the most racist show on tv since it portrays a nuclear family who have good jobs, do well financially, and doesn't listen to hip-hop but are black. Somehow this means they are not black enough and this is supposed to be funny. They are just "black-ish." The entire premise of the show is to laugh about how the stars of the show are not ghetto, the way they are supposed to be I guess? Where is BLM when you need em?
This Newsweek article is just a sign of the times because a once respected beacon of honesty and integrity has joined the ranks of trash-reporting that fuels an unnecessary racial fire and does so by excluding crucial information on their quest to deception.
Sorry Newsweek, but you have relegated yourself to the pile of...
