In a recent article discussing Vice President Harris, the author calls Harris by only her first name in the title, sparking a lot of debate on respect from Twitter users. The article details the vice president’s recent diagnosis with COVID-19 and the new COVID-19 antiviral pill. The article has three different authors credited, but was tweeted by Lauren Gardner, who said that the article details why Harris chose to take the new pill by Pfizer, called “Paxlovid.” The article explains that this pill is prescribed for those who are “at high risk for progression to severe COVID-19.”
Dove into the @VP Paxlovid news w/@AlexThomp tonight in West Wing Playbook: why did she get a drug a lot of Americans haven’t been able to access in the four months it’s been available? 1/https://t.co/RHrl0v0ujM
— Lauren Gardner (@Gardner_LM) April 27, 2022
The article explains that VP Harris took the pill, which surprised some health officials since they previously stated that she was asymptotic. But, many were concerned that the article casually refers to the vice president as just “Kamala” as many thought this was too casual of a way to refer to a public official in an article, especially the vice president. Immediately, the article took off on Twitter, as people criticized this and believed it to be disrespectful and inappropriate.
Good morning, white male journalists.
Address Kamala Harris as Vice President Harris… that’s what she is… The Vice President. pic.twitter.com/1R3xvYGBIN
— Viktor’s RenaiSéance (@wondermann5) April 28, 2022
Put respect on Vice President Harris’ name. Did you ever loosely refer to Mike Pence as simply “Mike” during his term serving as Vice President? Your white male privilege, racism, & misogyny are showing, @samstein. Believe us when we tell you, this is exactly what you’re doing. https://t.co/Y3okEhkkx5
— Mattison (@Mattison) April 28, 2022
Others criticized the article for the lack of a story that it presents. Many pointed out that the fact that the pill is not widely accessible to citizens is an issue and something that should be looked into, but the fact that the vice president had access to it is not an actual story. “But why Kamala got it—that’s not a story. She’s in the national command authority of the United States. Duh. We also don’t ask why she gets secret service protection or top-secret clearance. Duh,” one person commented on Twitter.
At a minimum, journalism standards would have you call her by her last name: Harris. But you really should refer to her in the first reference as Vice President Harris, and never by only her first name. The disrespect is telling.
— David Lytle (@davitydave) April 28, 2022
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Overall, many saw an issue with the journalists referring to VP Harris in such a casual way, especially since many pointed out that this was not an issue with President Biden, as there are not many journalists simply referring to him as “Joe.”
