The morning radio, without women

The analysis of whether Àngels Barceló's departure from SER has political motivations and whether it should be read as a right-wing shift by the Prisa group is overlooking another aspect, one that is indeed unequivocal and not subject to more or less interested speculation: the mess that next season's radio dial will be, both in Catalonia and Spain, in terms of morning programming. Because the Catalan journalist, the only woman left hosting a morning magazine, will be replaced by Aimar Bretos.

Let's review. In Catalonia we have Ricard Ustrell and Jordi Basté: they haven't announced renewals yet, but there's no news that a change is due on either side. And in Spain there will be Bretos, Carlos Herrera on Cope, the duo Rafa Latorre and Carlos Alzina on Onda Cero, and Juan Ramón Lucas on RNE. Zero out of six. We could also look at music stations, which tend to have younger audiences. El matí i la mare que el va parir, from Flaix, is captained by Carles Pérez, and Matina Codina, from RAC105, by Ernest Codina. And in Spain we have Dani Moreno as the main voice of Los40, Jaime Moreno on Atrévete, from Cadena Dial, and Xavi Rodríguez on Kiss FM. On Cadena 100, the two presenters –Javi Nieves and Mar Amate– do follow the equality plan more closely, but, despite this, in all these programs, women appear in secondary positions: the man's name appears first or is in a more prominent position in photos, with the woman just behind. Semiotics don't lie. Salaries, probably, don't either. Twelve out of twelve morning programs with a man at the helm is not a statistical singularity: it is an anomaly that speaks to the path that still needs to be trodden for women – overwhelmingly the majority in journalism and audiovisual communication faculties – to have the equitable recognition they deserve and identical opportunities to reach positions of power.