Vanity Fair’s Twitter Chick List Sparks Controversy
Vanity Fair recently published an article titled “America’s Tweethearts,” listing six women as some of the Twitter celebrities to appear in recent years. Accompanying the article was a photo of the six women clad in trench coats and stiletto heels.
After seeing countless magazines attempt this kind of “round-up” feature on Twitter users, I paid the article little attention. I scanned the photo caption for names I recognized, then got back to my own Twitter feed.
The next day, I stumbled across a blog post from Felicia Day, one of the women highlighted in the article.
Felicia’s Response
“When I was first approached to do the shoot,” Felicia wrote, “I was very excited. The photography in the magazine has always been the best in the business, and the fact that they were interested in doing a piece about Twitter and New Media gave me hope that a magazine firmly in the ‘establishment’ was interested in exploring the subject in a new light.
“And then during breakfast I saw some weird Twitter comments go by…and then I read the article…and oh, gosh. Really?!”
Felicia’s first complaint (after praising photographer Michael Halsband for the “GORGEOUS image”) was regarding the article’s usage of words such as “tweeple,” “twilebrity,” and “Twinformation superhighway:” signs, she believed, that the writer had little first-hand experience of the subject matter.
But what really bothered Felicia was the writer’s repeated jabs at the tweethearts’ intelligence: “For tweeple, e-mail messages are sonnets, Facebook is practically Tolstoy,” the article read. “Those of us who still read are hoping this is a jump-the-shark moment.”
In other words: the women in the article were being … horror of horrors … objectified!
Just A Jealous Bitch
Part of me felt disgusted along with Felicia. But another part of me wanted to shout, ‘Well, what did you expect?’
The comments on Felicia’s post were equally two-sided. “The photo is ab-fab, but the article isn’t worth the dead trees it’s printed on,” one wrote. Said another: “That is 
a pretty useless article, but hey look on the bright side, you still look hot in the photo!”
And here’s a real zinger: “You look gorgeous in the picture, and I’m sorry a jealous bitch was the one writing the article.”
Consensus: Vanity Fair sucks for making these “tweethearts” look like bimbos. But at least they’re hot bimbos!
Hot Chicks
Let’s get real: Vanity Fair wasn’t giving a serious commentary on how new media is changing the way people communicate. And it certainly wasn’t attempting to create a list of authoritative female Twitter users. To do so might have involved using women who were old, or fat, or not white. In other words, women who didn’t look like they belonged on the cast of “The Hills.”
No, Vanity Fair wanted some hot chicks to grace its pages, and to distinguish them from all the other hot chicks on its pages, they gave the whole thing a “Twitter” theme.
Does that excuse Vanity Fair for downplaying the achievements of these six women? No. Does it necessitate a 1,300-word snarkfest on Twitter’s more mundane points? No.
But is anyone really all that surprised that it did? I hope not. ’Cause that would take a real bimbo.
What do you think? Was Vanity Fair way outta line, or are people making something out of nothing? Let me know by leaving a comment below.
PS: If you want a real list of Twitter women to follow without the glam, check out Forbes’ 14 Power Women to Follow on Twitter. And then follow me, @KellyWatson, for more unique views on women and business.
4 Responses to Vanity Fair’s Twitter Chick List Sparks Controversy
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P.S… and if you took the time to read the Forbes 14 Power Women to follow on Twitter, you would of noted that Julia Roy a brilliant social strategist is one of the 14 Power Women!! Do your research!
I'm not sure what you mean by “do your research,” Eileen … I did notice that Julia Roy was listed in both articles. I just felt that the Forbes article was much more respectful of these ladies and their accomplishments.
Come on. That piece reeks of ambush. Do you honestly believe these people would volunteer for contemptuous character assassination? These women are not attention whores in the vacuous manner of “celebutards” like Heidi Montag or Paris Hilton. I am sure they were approached with an entirely different spin on the article, focusing on the power of new media and their position as vanguards of its use.
I know Felicia Day, for example, has said that there were multiple photo shoots from the demure to the risque and that her interview was extensive and covered many substantive topics. In light of that, it is not so unbelievable that it was surprising to see the final article and its complete disdain for and belittling of its subjects, their intellects, and the whole concept of Twitter itself.
You HAVE to be aware of journalists who selectively edit to serve their purpose. This piece was nothing more than a written middle finger aimed by a journalist frightened at the uncertainty of old media’s future.
Not quite right. Lookup the piece Grigoriadis did “Everybody Sucks”. This isn't old media vs new media. This is the zeitgeist of new media as realized in Vanity Fair. The fun of watching this is watching each of the players and the also ins try to spin it to their particular cause, old media vs new media, hipness of social media, sexism, agism, and so on. The irony is delicious. The VF6 is being hung out to dry by a culture of which they are both the avatar and the scapegoats of new technology.
In a sense, their hotness or glamous has almost nothing to do with what is really going on here and too many of the blog mavens are too caught up in that same culture to see it. Read VG's article cited above. You'll see more of these articles. Why? Editorial policy in a time when EVERYONE is fighting for page views.
They aren't victims. They're just…. next.