Journalistic mainstreaming is the concentrated effort by newspapers to include quotes from minority groups in articles that are not specifically about minority issues. While the initiative to broaden people's communities by including voices that might normally go unheard should be something that is considered laudable, you have to question the motivations for the mainstreaming. Some publications, such as the Los Angeles Times started making quotas for their paper, which include that each front page must have at least one minority quote, and that all stories that are not breaking news must also include a minority quote.
Why are the publications doing this? If it's for broadening our community, and making points of views known that might otherwise be overlooked, then that is commendable. However, if it's done just for the sake of political correctness, or worse, an attempt to tap into a market for the sake of drawing in new advertising dollars, then I believe a line has been crossed. Some newspapers policy of requiring a certain amount of minority quotes to be considered for advancement seems to be a classic case of political correctness that is missing the spirit of the issue at hand.
If journalism is about reporting news in an interesting way, then the burden falls upon the journalist. Including quotes from minorities for the sake of having them does not do anything to enhance the story or educate the reader. If we truly want journalism that encompasses minority points of view, shouldn't the concentration instead be on creating newsrooms that more accurately reflect our community? If the majority of journalists are middle class Caucasian men, then the stories that are published will naturally reflect that. Shoehorning in minority quotes will not suddenly make the articles all-encompassing of all viewpoints, that can only be accomplished by creating more diversity in the actual newsrooms that are employed by newspaper publishers.
Surprisingly there are few Youtube clips to be found that deal with journalistic mainstreaming, so I will settle for a Ricky Gervais clip.
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