On Tuesday the Republican Party approved a plank to its convention platform opposing abortion in all cases.
The Huffington Post responded with an arresting homepage image:
As Erik Wemple reported first, HuffPost front-page editor Whitney Snyder and senior editor Danny Shea conceived the idea, which Arianna Huffington “loved.” Reached by phone, founding editor Roy Sekoff said the image “went right up to the line of offensive” and reminded him of George Lois’ classic Esquire covers and that he wants the site’s “tops” to have “the same power.”
The image is a stock photo, he said. “I love it because it’s very elegant,” Sekoff said. “It’s beautifully art-directed for a stock image.”
Newsweek acknowledged Huffington Post’s homepage — “Whoa there, Huffington Post!” — on its Tumblr. Then, it replaced its Tumblr cursor icon with a coat hanger in a blog post that said only, “We’re retiring the mustache cursor for the day. Here’s our new one: a coat hanger.” The comments on this particular move indicated that buzz has been generated.
“The coat hanger has clearly become a symbolic icon that triggers outrage and debate in our hearts and minds,” Newsweek PR director Andrew Kirk wrote in an emailed statement.
“We chose to switch the Tumblr cursor to a coat hanger after seeing the strong reactions our friends at the Huffington Post received. After all, 40 years after the Roe. v. Wade decision, a woman’s right to choose is still leading the national debate and influencing the Republican Party’s national platform.”
Related: “Is Tina Brown serious about Newsweek anymore?” (Capital) | “The Huffington Post makes no pretense of driving up the middle of America’s ideological road” (Washington Post)
Comments