Lisa LaFlamme firing stirs debate about sexism, ageism in Canada

LaFlamme, who coated the largest tales of her time, together with elections, wars and pure disasters, posted a video to Twitter Monday saying that she had been knowledgeable in late June that her profession with CTV Information was over after mother or father firm Bell Media determined to finish her contract. She had labored for the community for 35 years and had slightly below two years left on her contract, based on the Globe and Mail.

“I used to be blindsided and am nonetheless shocked and saddened by Bell Media’s resolution,” LaFlamme stated, including that she had been requested to maintain her firing confidential for weeks.

“At 58, I nonetheless thought I’d have much more time to inform extra of the tales that influence our every day lives,” she instructed followers. “Whereas it’s crushing to be leaving CTV Nationwide Information in a way that’s not my alternative, please know reporting to you has actually been the best honor of my life and I thanks for all the time being there.”

In a assertion Monday, CTV stated it had made a “enterprise resolution” to pursue a “completely different course” for the chief information anchor position, citing “altering viewer habits.” The community introduced the identical day that nationwide affairs correspondent Omar Sachedina, 39, would step into the position.

LaFlamme’s firing drew condemnation from viewers, colleagues within the media business and outstanding figures in Canada, together with retired Grammy-winning singer Anne Murray.

The Canadian media have persevering with to cowl the fallout, with studies recommended varied components behind LaFlamme’s firing, together with clashes between the anchor and CTV Information head Michael Melling over sources for protection of the conflict in Ukraine, amongst different points.

However one avenue of hypothesis has touched a nerve amongst Canadian girls left questioning: Was it the hair?

LaFlamme made headlines when she stopped dyeing her hair in 2020. Throughout a particular year-in-review broadcast, she instructed viewers that the pandemic had prevented her from visiting her hairstylist, and she or he was uninterested in spraying her roots every day earlier than happening air, based on the Globe and Mail. “I lastly stated, ‘Why trouble? I’m going grey,’ she stated. “Actually, if I had recognized the lockdown might be so liberating on that entrance I’d have achieved it quite a bit sooner.”

The transfer resonated with Canadian girls who’ve confronted societal stress to dye their hair. However it apparently ruffled the feathers of high CTV Information govt Michael Melling, the Globe and Mail reported.

A senior CTV official instructed the newspaper that Melling had requested who had permitted the choice to “let Lisa’s hair go grey” and later commented on the purple hue of LaFlamme’s locks underneath studio lighting.

Canadian girls took to Twitter this week to have fun the previous anchor for embracing her grey hair and proudly owning her age.

“Lisa LaFlamme allowed herself to age on digicam and in doing so gave me the boldness to shine in my pure magnificence as I age,” one Twitter person, Sarah M, wrote on Monday, calling CTV Information’ resolution “an enormous mistake.”

Others nervous that LaFlamme’s firing would ship a message to middle-aged girls that they might face skilled penalties in the event that they opted for a extra pure look.

Many recommended sexism and ageism had performed a job in LaFlamme’s dismissal. Some media consultants identified that her predecessor, Lloyd Robertson, retired from the chief anchor position at 77 and was given an on-air ship off.

Bell Media didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark Friday.

LaFlamme “has made an necessary contribution to Canadian tv information over the previous 35 years,” learn a assertion Bell Media posted to Twitter Monday, signed by firm president Wade Oosterman and senior vice chairman Karine Moses. The corporate would provoke an impartial, third-party “inside office assessment of our newsroom,” the assertion continued.

LaFlamme’s dismissal led some to name for Melling’s ouster, and Canadian media reported that CTV Information has been compelled to do harm management with its personal workers.

Moses stated in an e-mail to workers that LaFlamme was given the chance to say goodbye to viewers earlier than she left the anchor’s chair, however that she had “opted to not say goodbye to the general public,” Canadian broadcaster Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported. The anchor shake-up was a part of a shift towards digital content material creation on the information outlet, Moses wrote.

The backlash to LaFlamme’s firing has sparked its personal backlash. In right-wing circles, figures similar to Maxime Bernier, head of the far-right Folks’s Celebration of Canada, seizing the second to divert consideration to the firing by Canadian firms of hundreds of staff who declined coronavirus vaccines.

Some outstanding media figures, in the meantime, lamented that the controversy round LaFlamme’s ouster obscured the importance of her substitute’s hiring. Sachedina, an award-winning reporter who has labored at CTV Information since 2009, was born in Canada to folks of Indian descent from Uganda — an underrepresented background in Canadian media.

“A Muslim man helming the largest Nationwide information program — historical past,” World Information journalist Ahmar Khan tweeted. “However, variety doesn’t cowl the gaps of mistreatment.”

Sammy Westfall and Amanda Coletta contributed to this report.