Remember the mommy blogger outrage over Motrin? Well, it’s happened again. But this time, instead of “Wearing Your Baby” that has the community up in arms, it’s “How Health Writers Can Be Putting You at Risk.”
I’m not a Marie Claire reader (although I did like the Style Channel series Running in Heels), and I never had anything against the magazine. But I do today. The article, “The Hunger Diaries,” written by AOL News health and science reporter Katie Drummond, is slated to run in the November issue of the magazine and is already online. Thousands of people have already read the article, which slams six popular healthy living bloggers: Kath Younger (katheats.com), Tina Haupert (carrotsncake.com), Meghann Anderson (graduatemeghann.com), Caitlin Boyle (healthytippingpoint.com), Heather Pare (hangrypants.com) and Jenna Weber (eatliverun.com). Basically, Drummond is saying that these women may preach health, but they have a distorted way of eating and exercising to the extreme and in turn, are putting their readers in jeopardy.
I have read all of these blogs and am a regular reader of Caitlin’s and Jenna’s, following them through their journeys of health and life. The two are active, young women who celebrate food and fitness and even raised thousands of dollars for cancer research together biking a century race, among other accomplishments such as positively impacting the ways their readers are viewing their own health.
I may be biased as a reader, but I think it’s a little hypocritical for MC to run this article while at the same time have articles on its website (under the health section) with headlines, “From Fat to Fitness,” and “Get Jennifer Aniston’s Body.” Not once have I read Caitlin or Jenna’s blogs and gotten those messages. I’ve gotten positive, inspiring messages.
But enough about my own feelings. The real question is, will this help or hurt Marie Claire? As of this post, the only thing MC has put out is this tweet:
Are some health bloggers putting their readers at risk? The article that has EVERYONE talking: http://ow.ly/2O8CL #fitblog
And posed this question on Facebook:
Are some of the web’s most popular healthy living bloggers putting its own readers at risk? Read the article that has everyone talking … and tell us what YOU think.
Hundreds of comments are pouring in on Facebook and Twitter, outraged at the magazine and the article’s writer for such a one-sided, fabricated take on these women. Also as of this post, only Kath has yet to formerly respond, but the other ladies have:
Heather: The Marie Claire Article
Caitlin: My Rebuttal to Marie Claire
Tina: My Response to the Marie Claire Article
Meghann: My Response
And my personal favorite:
I’m not a Marie Claire reader (although I did like the Style Channel series Running in Heels), and I never had anything against the magazine. But I do today. The article, “The Hunger Diaries,” written by AOL News health and science reporter Katie Drummond, is slated to run in the November issue of the magazine and is already online. Thousands of people have already read the article, which slams six popular healthy living bloggers: Kath Younger (katheats.com), Tina Haupert (carrotsncake.com), Meghann Anderson (graduatemeghann.com), Caitlin Boyle (healthytippingpoint.com), Heather Pare (hangrypants.com) and Jenna Weber (eatliverun.com). Basically, Drummond is saying that these women may preach health, but they have a distorted way of eating and exercising to the extreme and in turn, are putting their readers in jeopardy.
I have read all of these blogs and am a regular reader of Caitlin’s and Jenna’s, following them through their journeys of health and life. The two are active, young women who celebrate food and fitness and even raised thousands of dollars for cancer research together biking a century race, among other accomplishments such as positively impacting the ways their readers are viewing their own health.
I may be biased as a reader, but I think it’s a little hypocritical for MC to run this article while at the same time have articles on its website (under the health section) with headlines, “From Fat to Fitness,” and “Get Jennifer Aniston’s Body.” Not once have I read Caitlin or Jenna’s blogs and gotten those messages. I’ve gotten positive, inspiring messages.
But enough about my own feelings. The real question is, will this help or hurt Marie Claire? As of this post, the only thing MC has put out is this tweet:
Are some health bloggers putting their readers at risk? The article that has EVERYONE talking: http://ow.ly/2O8CL #fitblog
And posed this question on Facebook:
Are some of the web’s most popular healthy living bloggers putting its own readers at risk? Read the article that has everyone talking … and tell us what YOU think.
Hundreds of comments are pouring in on Facebook and Twitter, outraged at the magazine and the article’s writer for such a one-sided, fabricated take on these women. Also as of this post, only Kath has yet to formerly respond, but the other ladies have:
Heather: The Marie Claire Article
Caitlin: My Rebuttal to Marie Claire
Tina: My Response to the Marie Claire Article
Meghann: My Response
And my personal favorite:
Jenna (via Facebook): Thanks for everyone’s support in regards to the recent Marie-Claire article. I think my blog speaks for itself and don’t feel the need to verbally defend myself when my intentions are made clear daily.
The fact of the matter is, when writing such a controversial article about such a tight-knit community of bloggers and readers, be prepared to respond. It’s been hours (and in social media world, that’s forever) and MC nor Drummond have yet to make any formal responses. Drummond simply re-tweeted, “Word, thx! RT @fashionablyfit: Journos [should] “comfort the afflicted & afflict the comfortable.” I tip my hat 2 @marieclaire @katiedrumm“
That’s it? Well, that’s not enough. Bloggers: 1, Marie Claire: 0. And as Jenna brilliantly said it, “At the end of the day, I just want to eat.”
UPDATE 10/6/10:
Response from Kath here.
From PR Junkie, Marie Claire‘s response:
“To our readers: Thank you all for your responses to this article. Since the piece went online, hundreds of you have written to us. Twitter, Facebook, your blogs, and comments on our website have all been lighting up with messages, and we are thrilled to hear from you. Some of you wrote in anger, while others applauded us for voicing concerns about this community. We believe the outpouring of comments proves the issues raised in the piece are important. This is a controversial subject, and we always welcome a good debate. Like every article published in Marie Claire, this one was researched and edited carefully over the course of many months, and we stand by its content. Thank you for letting us know how you feel — we are listening!”
OK, good you are listening. Not good it took you so long to respond. Also not good? Standing by that article. As a PR pro, someone who took journalism courses in college and someone who works for a former journalist, aren’t they forgetting the biased, one-sided, contorted information printed in this article? Guess not. I tip my hat to the print industry and journalists in general, as my job depends on them. Not to mention that’s a huge source of my information and entertainment. But I also tip my hat to bloggers for being real. As for Drummond, still nothing. Guess she stands by her words. But I don’t. Bloggers: 2, Marie Claire: -1.
The fact of the matter is, when writing such a controversial article about such a tight-knit community of bloggers and readers, be prepared to respond. It’s been hours (and in social media world, that’s forever) and MC nor Drummond have yet to make any formal responses. Drummond simply re-tweeted, “Word, thx! RT @fashionablyfit: Journos [should] “comfort the afflicted & afflict the comfortable.” I tip my hat 2 @marieclaire @katiedrumm“
That’s it? Well, that’s not enough. Bloggers: 1, Marie Claire: 0. And as Jenna brilliantly said it, “At the end of the day, I just want to eat.”
UPDATE 10/6/10:
Response from Kath here.
From PR Junkie, Marie Claire‘s response:
“To our readers: Thank you all for your responses to this article. Since the piece went online, hundreds of you have written to us. Twitter, Facebook, your blogs, and comments on our website have all been lighting up with messages, and we are thrilled to hear from you. Some of you wrote in anger, while others applauded us for voicing concerns about this community. We believe the outpouring of comments proves the issues raised in the piece are important. This is a controversial subject, and we always welcome a good debate. Like every article published in Marie Claire, this one was researched and edited carefully over the course of many months, and we stand by its content. Thank you for letting us know how you feel — we are listening!”
OK, good you are listening. Not good it took you so long to respond. Also not good? Standing by that article. As a PR pro, someone who took journalism courses in college and someone who works for a former journalist, aren’t they forgetting the biased, one-sided, contorted information printed in this article? Guess not. I tip my hat to the print industry and journalists in general, as my job depends on them. Not to mention that’s a huge source of my information and entertainment. But I also tip my hat to bloggers for being real. As for Drummond, still nothing. Guess she stands by her words. But I don’t. Bloggers: 2, Marie Claire: -1.
thank you!
Of course!
So true! Marie Claire definitely has a pr/social media crisis on their hands. I follow Meghann and Caitlin’s blogs, and the article served only to portray them in a dark light that I would never associate with their positive messages regarding healthy living and exercise. I also thought it was interesting the article failed to mention Caitlin’s Operation Beautiful campaign, which serves ONLY to reinforce a positive self-image for women.
As a personal aside, I stopped reading women’s magazines (Marie Claire, Cosmo, etc) over a year ago and focused my attention to healthy living blogs, which I found to be much more useful for my day to day life and more in line with my fitness goals. This article only reinforces my decision.
That’s interesting you switched from women’s mags to blogs. I quit Cosmo, too (I couldn’t take the countless articles on “101 Ways to Please Your Man.” Pretty sure there’s only one 😉 ). Anyways, now I subscribe to Shape but the blogs I can better relate to because they’re real people. Magazines should take note of the HL blog community.
I also enjoyed the show Running in Heels, which is largely because I enjoy watching Nina Garcia do anything.
I actually think this is a positive thing for the blogs and a stupid move for Marie Claire. While I am not necessarily a member of the target audience for these blogs, I’d never heard of them before this little scandal. It seems likely that readership to the blogs will grow as people take notice (and gain more page views) while Marie Claire continues on its journey to complete irrelevance. I bet that in a month Meghann’s answer about how much she makes from page views will be higher.
Yes, Nina is awesome!
These blogs have a huge, close-knit following and have had success because they are real people talking about real things.
Thank you for commenting!
I’m in the same boat and 100% agree with you. I’m a regular reader of a few of the blogs, and totally commend these women for their dedication to not only health & fitness, but their blogs which let us follow along with them. As with anything else, aren’t we as readers responsible for digesting the information on our own? We’re not being brainwashed here, people!
(p.s. I’m a native Clevelander, so it pains me just a TEENSY bit to claim commaraderie with a P-burgher)
(p.s.s Go Browns!)
🙂
You know, I liked you until you said Go Browns. 😉 Haha, actually I was born in Cleveland, so the city holds a special place in my heart. The football team…not so much!
And totally agree about your comment. The bloggers aren’t TELLING you to do anything, they’re just SHOWING you what’s worked for them. Apparently MC didn’t get that memo.
Thank you for commenting!
Strange this post is totaly unrelated to what I was searching google for, but it was listed on the first page. I guess your doing something right if Google likes you enough to put you on the first page of a non related search.
That is funny! Maybe because I profess my love for Google daily? 🙂
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