Magazine Fail

Esquire Apologizes For ‘Shit-Sniffing Faggot’

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Looks like Esquire editor David Granger heard your jaws hit the ground. When readers received the current issue, they were slapped with an article on “How To Be a Man,” which recommended throwing around curse words to show your machismo. This included the phrase “shit-sniffing faggot,” which Esquire advised you use when talking to your neighbor. Advocating homophobia much? Now, an apology:

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The statement issued by Esquire:

In the “How to Curse” section of our May 2009 feature, “How to Skin a Moose,” we presented a parody of extreme profanity and its users, contrasting exaggerated examples of offensive language with ordinary situations. The target of the parody was profanity itself and not the various people who might be its object, including gay people. But we used a particularly offensive phrase we shouldn’t have. It certainly was not our intent to cause pain. Judging from the reaction, we did. For that we are sincerely sorry.

Meanwhile, one of our own Queerty readers contacted Esquire to demand, like, WHAT THE FUCK THEY WERE THINKING. They responded:

In the “How to Curse” section of our May 2009 feature, “How to Skin a Moose,” we presented a parody of extreme profanity and its users, contrasting exaggerated examples of offensive language with ordinary situations. The target of the parody was profanity itself and not the various people who might be its object, whether nine-year-old-boys, female police officers, gay people, or the vision-impaired. The absurdity of the context should be clear. But to those who take particular offense at our mocking of offensive language, we apologize.

Sincerely,
The Editors

It didn’t end there. Our reader followed up with:

Thank you for the apology but you have to realize that kids are killing themselves and kids are killing kids because of comments like that. Where do you draw the line when it comes to humor? And I’m not the one you should apologize to. It’s a perfect chance for you to step up to the plate with this. There is a lesson in here if you are compassionate enough to see it.

To which Esquire hit back with:

We do appreciate your concerns and are doing our best to address them. Right now, we are putting an apology on the home page of our website and we have recalled a page from the June issue, which had closed, so that we can add a box including that apology to the first editorial page of the issue. The last thing we want to do is cause any reader or any citizen undue pain. In general, we attempt a generosity of spirit that tries to include people rather than alienate them.

Good enough? Case closed? Forgive and forget?

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