NECN Tries out Sexist Endorsement Coverage

NECN’s report of Rep. Niki Tsongas’s endorsement of Coakley demeaned the endorsement by implying that Tsongas’s choice may have been based on gender and therefore not merit.  Why would the reporters do that?  Tsongas and Coakley both denied that gender played a role.  Tsongas said: 

I’m supporting the candidate who I believe will be the most effective US Senator. 

And yet the whole report revolved around gender.  Sheila Capone-Wulsin,  Executive Director of the Mass. Women’s Political Caucus said that in covering prior candidates’ endorsements,

I wonder if they asked the same question when Congressman Frank endorsed Congressman Capuano.  Was he endorsing him because he was a man?  (video follows.)

Of course reporters did not ask whether gender was a role in the Frank/Capuano endorsement.  Reporters assume that if one man is endorsing another man it’s because that man is competent.  To then turn around and ask women such a question is insulting and biased because the question’s very existence carries the presumption that the candidate’s qualifications weren’t enough to merit the endorsement.

Where’s Alison King? She usually handles these things well.