The Last Female Staff Reporter Quits the 'New York Observer'

As of five weeks ago, there were two women staff reporters at the New York Observer. Three weeks ago, one of those women quit; today, Irina Aleksander, the last woman staff reporter, has given notice. (We hear she’ll be writing regularly for Times Styles — Alexandra Jacobs, a long-time Observer editor, decamped for Times Styles two months ago.) According to the paper’s newly updated masthead, the paper now has nine staff writers, all of them men. (Of its non-staff “contributing writers” list of 13, two are women.) This all comes not long after the last woman editor — excluding the managing editor — quit. In the last month, one man was hired at the paper as a reporter (and he’s doing good work!) and another man was promoted from within. (A woman designer was also recently hired.) By our count, nine out of nine of the latest Observer departures were women or gay men. All left in the last three months. (P.S. Some good stuff in today’s (err, yesterday’s!) paper! Have a browse!)