Atlanta magazine has reportedly lost half its staff in recent weeks after employees were informed to stay away from "woke" and "divisive" issues that could alienate readers.
The Washington Post published an in-depth report on Wednesday that put a spotlight on a mass exodus after the publisher "pushed back on their effort to present a modern picture of life in one of the Blackest, queerest cities" in America.
Staffers of Atlanta magazine, which bills itself as the city’s "premier general interest publication," gathered in June for a meeting with publisher Sean McGinnis, according to the Post. The meeting, which was described as "tense," was an attempt for McGinnis to get to the bottom of how the magazine handles pronouns and other issues related to "divisive" topics.
"Are we, as a matter of fact, now writing stories based upon preferred pronouns? ‘She’ is referred to as ‘they’ throughout the story," McGinnis asked, according to the Post, citing audio of the meeting it obtained.
Editors reportedly pushed back, informing their boss that "using pronouns corresponding with a subject’s identity is standard journalistic practice" and not a political statement, but McGinnis disagreed.
"People will think that that is taking a stance," McGinnis said, according to the Post.
Washington Post media reporter Laura Wagner noted it was "hardly the first time colleagues have disagreed over editorial choices — in Atlanta or anywhere in the media industry, where business concerns, personal politics, and news judgment often come into conflict," but this time was different.
"McGinnis’s statements and subsequent request to approve editorial content ahead of publication marked a tipping point in a small-scale culture war that had been building for a few years within the award-winning magazine," Wagner wrote. "Staffers saw the interference as an egregious crackdown on coverage that management deems as too ‘progressive’— at a time when they are resolved to reflect the evolving reality of Atlanta, one of the Blackest, queerest cities in the South."
Since the meeting, three of the magazine’s six full-time editorial staffers have quit "citing untenable corporate interference," and the publication’s top editor announced plans to retire, according to the Post.
Sam Worley, one of the departing editors, wrote in a resignation letter that "any journalist… would feel challenged to work in a place where the line between the edit side and the business side is as eroded as it’s become this year," according to the Post.
The Post then reported there is concern inside the magazine that McGinnis is taking orders from parent company Hour Media.
"His current and former employees say they are concerned that their longtime boss’s perception of Atlanta’s leftward drift is based less on his own opinions than on orders from his bosses — the owners of a Michigan-based publishing company that purchased Atlanta and several other regional magazines — who, McGinnis told them, believe ‘woke’ coverage is bad for business and wants it to stop," Wagner wrote.
The publisher offering editorial feedback is nothing new, as the Post also reported that McGinnis urged the magazine to remove a 2018 illustration of polarizing NFL player-turned-activist Colin Kaepernick, who is a hero of the far-left but has been widely criticized by conservatives for kneeling during the national anthem and making inflammatory remarks.
Atlanta magazine staffers also complained to the Post that McGinnis once said a specific issue was "too urban," which employees reportedly understood to mean "too Black."
Staffers told the Post that the editorial shift began in 2017 when Hour Media purchased Atlanta, along with other regional magazines, for $6.5 million.
"Hour Media, though, instituted a new chain of command, in which each editor in chief answered to the magazine’s publisher, who reported directly to corporate brass," Wagner wrote.
Hour Media did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
During the June meeting, the Post reported that a "clearly nervous" McGinnis read off a list of topics he considers "divisive," which included Black Lives Matter, former President Trump, Defund the Police, Dylan Mulvaney, Bud Light and Target, along with abortion and transgender issues.
He also said a cover story about the Atlanta brunch scene featuring a "drag queen posing with chicken and waffles" could potentially cause a stir.
"Optics say a lot," McGinnis said, according to the Post. He did not respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment, and the Post reported he also did not reply to their requests.
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One of the Atlanta magazine employees who quit as a result told the Post that "assigning and editing stories [is] impossibly burdensome" if they have to take wokeness into consideration.
Atlanta magazine and several remaining staffers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Fox News' Nikolas Lanum contributed to this report.
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