Esquire Called out for New Cover Story on White Male Teenager From Wisconsin: ‘Happy Black History Month’

“Isn’t every issue of Esquire about what it’s like to be white, male, and middle class,” Gawker founding editor Elizabeth Spiers says

Esquire

Esquire Magazine was called out on Twitter on Tuesday after revealing its March cover story, which featured a profile of a “white, middle class male” growing up “in the era of social media, school shootings, toxic masculinity, #MeToo, and a divided country.”

“As adults, it’s actually pretty easy to cop out: We don’t have to go to school, that bossy institution that pokes and prods you while people you don’t particularly like get to watch,” Esquire editor Jay Fielden said in a piece explaining the origins of the story on Tuesday

“Add to this the passions and change this moment has unleashed–#MeToo, gender fluidity, Black Lives Matter, “check your privilege,” and “#TheFutureIsFemale–and the task of grappling with the world has to be more complicated for kids than it’s ever been,” Fielden continued.

Fielden also added that the impetus for the piece had come from the experience of his own son and the children of other Esquire staffers. The profile itself — which you can read here — is focused on Ryan Morgan, a 17-year-old growing up in West Bend, Wisconsin.

Some, however, disagreed, taking umbrage with a white teenager on the cover of the iconic magazine.

“Happy Black History Month, everybody,” Soledad O’Brien wrote on Twitter.

“Isn’t every issue of Esquire about what it’s like to be white, male, and middle class? Emphasizing it on the cover seems redundant,” Gawker founding editor Elizabeth Spiers wrote in a Twitter post.

“Esquire’s new cover story is on what it’s like to be a white, middle class “American” boy. Just in time for White Middle Class American Boy History Month,” the official account of Comedy Central wrote of the cover.

In a tweet which appeared to have been meant as a direct message, Fielden thanked someone for defending him, and called his critics “digital Jacobins.”

Reps for Esquire didn’t respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.

https://twitter.com/espiers/status/1095343642334572547

https://twitter.com/jpbrammer/status/1095345318282100736

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