Are you as influential as Louis Tomlinson’s girlfriend?
By Emma.
Last week a list of the 140 most influential UK users of Twitter came out (yes, if you are one of those people who doesn’t like articles on Twitter, look away now). So far, so PR. It was put together as a bit of PR puffery for a Peer Index, a social analytics company (they work out which celebs you should try to get to tweet about your products). In many ways, you can tell how serious it is when every member of One Direction is deemed more influential than the Prime Minister. This list doesn’t matter.
So why am I writing about it? Well it’s not importance of the list that matters but the coverage it got and the glaring omission both from the list and from the questioning of it.
Where are the women?
On this list of 140 “influencers” there are just 23 women. There is one in the top 10 and we scrape 2 in the top 20 and a whole 4 in the top 50.
The organisers would probably argue that the list is compiled by a formula and so they have no way of controlling this, but that would be untrue. The formula itself is a choice. They choose to measure through the metric of interactions with other tweeters – not the value or real terms impact of those tweets for example. So Frankie Cocozza is on the list but Caroline Criado-Perez is not.
And it is not as though the formula has not been tinkered with by Peer Index. According to the blogpost that accompanied the release of the list, they excluded “Journalists from the main national newspapers” (though the highest ranking woman is Times Columnist Caitlin Moran (9)) They also included “transatlantic Brits” like Pier Morgan and Casper Lee and Will.i.Am because “he always seems to pop up on British TV. All those named as example of exceptional inclusion are men.
So who are the lucky 23 deemed influential enough for Peer Index? Like the men, they are largely – as might be expected – a list of singers, models, actors, reality television stars and the occasional writer or politician. But two descriptions jumped out at me. The third most influential UK woman on Twitter is Eleanor Calder (27) who is described as “Louis Tominson’s girlfriend” and the ninth most influential is Anne Twist “Harry Styles’ Mother”. So two of our 23 have their rationale for inclusion described solely through their relationship with a man.
Does any of this really matter in the grand scheme of things? This list, almost certainly not. But the fact that the lack of women on this list and the way in which women’s worth continues to be measured – even by a mathematical metric – through there defined roles in support of men has not been remarked upon worries me. The list was covered by tabloids and broadsheets alike. Jokes were made about One Direction and Ed Sheeran ranking about David Cameron. Some in politics noted the difference in ranking between Ed Miliband (29) and David Cameron (7). No one seems to have noticed the lack of women. The lack of women has become unremarkable.
This is what troubles me. Why aren’t these questions being asked more widely. Why did no one – even when the list was trending and was being widely discussed – seem to notice the complete side-lining of women’s role in our public conversations? Did Peer Index themselves not notice it and think it worthy of consideration?
Unimportant PR fluff fills the pages of our national newspapers daily. It influences what is talked about on television and in offices. When you ignore the side-lining of women in these “unimportant” areas, you contribute to the culture that normalises that side-lining. When we accept that defining a woman’s role through the lens of her relationship with a man in these lists, we tacitly accept it in all walks of life.
I know very little about Eleanor Calder. I hope she goes on to change the world in some extraordinary way. When she does, will she still simply be Loius Tomlinson’s girlfriend. I hope not and fear so.
