1.
“Do You Know How to Behave?” January 30–February 12
New York’s most recent cover story asked readers, “Do You Know How to Behave?” Its 194 rules prompted much debate, with Susan Brannigan joking, “I’m so glad we’ve moved on from arguing about nepo babies to arguing about etiquette.” Christian Brown wrote that what makes this “new etiquette guide so good is reading and nodding along like yep yep that’s normal yep of course yep and suddenly: bam, you’re told you have to text your friends three hours after you hang out to confirm that you
still like them.” BuzzFeed published its own “Terminally Online Version of New York Magazine’s Etiquette Rules,” featuring 61 social-media guidelines, while the Guardian’s Arwa Mahdawi offered her advice for “those of us who lead rather more mundane lives.” On Slate’s Culture Gabfest, Julia Turner said she “was surprised that the internet response to it was so big. I guess people were dying for a set of rules of behavior to both appreciate and argue with.” Some readers criticized rules they found classist or written from a privileged position. CNN’s Ariel Edwards-Levy wrote, “Starting off with ‘you don’t have to read all of your acquaintances’ new books’ is such an incredible tell about its presumptive audience.” Of the instruction not to “foist your allergies onto a dinner party,” Corey Ann Haydu countered, “This is so offensive … A person with a severe allergy cannot just be all chill and not inform ppl making them dinner.” In his Substack newsletter, Very Serious, Josh Barro argued, “Etiquette is for setting other people at ease … New York’s conception of etiquette is selfish: It’s about self-soothing.” The story became a segment on The View: “One of them said that in a group of two or more women, you shouldn’t call them ladies,” said Ana Navarro. When Joy Behar asked “Why not?,” she replied, “I know. I think it’s a hell of a lot better than bitches.”
2.
“The Promise of Pyer Moss”
The magazine also featured the Cut’s “Spring Fashion” issue with a cover showcasing Memphis rapper GloRilla. Journalist Nicolas-Tyrell Scott said, “GloRilla on The Cut? Whoever made that happen did something different.” As part of the special issue, Tahirah Hairston investigated what happened to Pyer Moss’s Kerby Jean-Raymond. The story caused considerable discussion within the fashion world. The Guardian’s Gloria Oladipo asked, “Where were you when you read The Cut’s article on Pyer Moss?” Bianca Vivion Brooks said the response took her back “to 2018 when I wrote a very inflammatory NYT opinion called ‘It Takes More Than Skin Color’ where I argued that representation was not a measure of artistic substance & we should be more discerning as a culture about who we platform.” Rechelle Dennis, co-founder of Girls United, a community platform for young Black women, cautioned, “White entrepreneurs are free to fail, learn, raise more money or move on, sometimes all of the above without personally charged think pieces and people applauding someone’s downfall.” On the podcast The Run-Through With Vogue, Chioma Nnadi said, “You so rarely see success stories in fashion around Black creators, and there was an aspect of it that felt like we’re tearing down this Black man … Like, why him? Why now?” And BuzzFeed’s Ade Onibada advised, “That Pyer Moss article is … complex. Anyone who reaches a decisive conclusion after one pass-through should probably take a step back and … reread it.”
3.
“Reality Check”
In “Reality Check,” Reeves Wiedeman wrote about the documentary-film industry’s internal reckoning. On the podcast The Town, Matthew Belloni said the story articulated “what many in the documentary world have felt over the past five to seven years, which is it’s never been a better time to make these kinds of films, and yet at the same time … there’s been this mixing of the tenets of documentary filmmaking with the economic interests and the ethos of reality television.” Lydia Polgreen, the former head of content at Gimlet Media, tweeted, “A lot of this is true about podcasting too, just on a miniature scale.” Rod Blackhurst, who co-directed Netflix’s Amanda Knox, noted, “There is seemingly always some other ‘director’ willing to make the ‘content’—to bend the rules and ethics.” Emmy-nominated producer Mynette Louie added, “If it’s any consolation, the streamers screwed up narrative features too!”
Send correspondence to [email protected]. Or go to nymag.com to respond to individual stories.