Aimee Allison, founder of She the People, and Soraya Chemaly, director, WMC's Speech Project and author of “Rage Becomes Her”, join Ali Velshi to discuss the obstacles facing women running for the nation’s highest office.

Last year’s Women’s Media Center report found wide disparities between men and women at the beat level, with men overrepresented in areas that tend to produce future newsroom leaders

News coverage decisions are overwhelmingly made by men, who lead the vast majority of newsrooms. Women make up two-thirds of journalism and communications grads, yet men write or produce 63% of all news coverage, according to the Women’s Media Center.

The overall percentage of female nominees in nonacting categories rose five percent from last year, according to the Women’s Media Center report, released Thursday ahead of Sunday’s awards ceremony.

Still, though, women make up only 30 percent of Oscar nominees for nonacting awards. Men held the majority of nominations in these categories by a wide margin, 70 percent.

This year, there’s a strong chance to break the streak via Greta Gerwig, a frontrunner in the adapted screenplay category for her film “Little Women." “I think if she wins, it has great meaning,” said Pat Mitchell, the activist and former PBS president who co-chairs the D.C.-based Women’s Media Center.“And if she loses? Well, that has great meaning, too.”

A report this week by the Women’s Media Center found that only 30% of all non-acting Oscar nominations went to women this year. Of the 186 total nominees in those categories, 56 are women, 130 are men.

Studies by the Women’s Media Center have found that seeing strong women onscreen boosts girls’ self-confidence: little girls who watch Rey become a Jedi in the most recent Star Wars films may aspire to be something beyond a love interest or the sidekick in their own lives.

In its report on women in the media, Women’s Media Center president Julie Burton writes, "Media tells our society (and our young people) what is important and who matters."

The penalties women face are seamlessly part of the culture — resident in social habits and gender roles, economic incentives, traditional mores, and more. So are the rewards that accrue to men who, conversely, experience misogyny as patriarchal entitlement.

According to the Women’s Media Center’s Speech Project, chat room participants with female usernames report receiving threatening or sexually explicit private messages 25 times more often than those with male or ambiguous usernames.

November 25 marks the observance of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. Gender-based violence persists around the world despite a 1994 United Nations resolution aimed at tackling the problem. And, rights groups say, new forms of violence are now surfacing.

Host, Carol Jenkins sits with Cristal Williams Chancellor, Director of Communications for the Women's Media Center and Journalist, Katti Gray to discuss the presence of women in color in the media or lack thereof.

McCarthy runs a WMC program called SheSource, which links journalists with more than 1,000 female experts in a number of fields, ranging from politics to entertainment to technology. I have since used the service to find a number of experts, and although it’s still growing, it has already proven itself immensely valuable.

The visual optics of that lineup are important, said Pat Mitchell, the former president of PBS and CNN who is co-chair of the Women’s Media Center. “Stereotypes still continue about what authority looks like, what power looks like, what credibility looks like,” she said. But the sound is important too.

In her downtime she hosts a weekly podcast, "WMC Live with Robin Morgan,” that gets half a million downloads across 110 countries.

And that podcast re-enforces the focus of the Women's Media Center which she created with her two close friends, Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem.

“The motto is simple, for women to be visible and powerful in media.”