Newsweek's latest exposé has social media in a frenzy over the choice of cover art.
To illustrate the "What Silicon Valley Thinks Of Women" article, the American news magazine created a cover illustration showing a computer cursor lifting up the skirt of a woman in a red dress.
Billed by Newsweek as a report of the "sordid, shocking and systemic" sexism in the Northern California technology hub home to Apple, Google and Yahoo, the attention-grabbing art has pundits and social media users questioning its appropriateness.
"Clickbait, designed to piss off women while pretending to investigate sexism in tech. Fail--but you know it," tweeted Jennifer Pozner, executive director of the analysis group Women In Media and News.
@stevekovach it's kind of like doing a story about rape & having the cover image be a cartoon with a victim handcuffed to a bed
— Carmel DeAmicis (@carmeldea) January 28, 2015
this seems ill advised pic.twitter.com/Fo263zSAgN
— Tony Romm (@TonyRomm) January 28, 2015
That @newsweek cover, @jimpoco? Clickbait, designed to piss off women while pretending to investigate sexism in tech. Fail--but you know it.
— Jennifer L. Pozner (@jennpozner) January 28, 2015
A great cover sells a story. It doesn't undercut its credibility. @KiraBind @ReaganGomez @sarahkendzior
— Goldie Taylor (@goldietaylor) January 28, 2015
@Newsweek Tomorrows cover is offensive to women and funny to those doing the discriminating. pic.twitter.com/RK7Aus5ooR What was the point?
— Julia Towne (@JuliaTowne) January 29, 2015
Newsweek editor Jim Impoco has not directly responded to the outcry but instead tweeted a line of approval taken from an Adweek review of the article, and also retweeted one commenter's reworking of the cover art to show the woman kicking the cursor away and her expletive-filled thought over the incident.
"Of course, if anyone bothered to read the accompanying article, they’d see that the cover is almost perfect" http://t.co/gt4MFlvISp
— jim impoco (@jimpoco) January 29, 2015