Colin’s Medium fare
Kaepernick to blog on race for Web site
C
OLIN Kaepernick has turned his civil rights work into a media gig.
Former NFL quarterback known for kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality and racial inequality, has joined blog site Medium to report and write on race.
Kaepernick, 32, will also join the board of the blogging Web site, founded by
Twitter co-founder Ev
Williams. Other board members include Williams, and venture capital executives Biz Stone, Josh Elman and Ben Horowitz. The athlete, who launched his own publishing company Kaepernick Publishing last year, will interview high-profile race leaders for Medium, as well as write his own articles. His stories and stories he supports will be posted on Level, Medium’s publication for men of color, as well as Momentum, a new civil rights blog.
“We must take control of narratives, the kind of control that will liberate us from seeing ourselves through the gaze of others,” he said. “The kind of control that can change the way we see the world and how the world sees us.”
Kaepernick became a lightning-rod figure when he began kneeling during the national anthem while a quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers in 2016, drawing criticism, including from President
Trump. He led the 49ers to the Super Bowl, but opted out of his contract after the season and has not played for any other team since.
He has recently reached an out-of-court settlement with the NFL amid allegations that the league colluded to keep him from playing with any other league team. He also has a seven-figure sponsorship deal with Nike.
The union push against Hearst Magazines is coming to a head — despite the fact that the publishing giant is among the few to spare employees from coronavirus cutbacks.
A mail-in vote has begun to determine whether 500 editorial, video, design, photo and social-media staff across 28 print and digital brands will be represented by the Writers Guild of America, East.
Hearst, whose publications include Esquire, Cosmopolitan, Harper’s Bazaar and Car & Driver, declined to comment. “We’re confident we’re going to win,” a spokesman for the WGAE told Media Ink.
It’s a situation that Hearst has worked hard to avoid. In April, the company announced it would make no cuts to staff at its newspapers, magazines and TV holdings, and gave 1 percent pay hikes to accommodate the hardship of working through the pandemic.
Last week, Hearst Magazines President Troy
Young and Chief Content Officer Kate Lewis may have scored a few points by raiding Condé Nast to hire Samira Nasr from Vanity Fair to be the new editor-in-chief of Harper’s Bazaar — marking the first black woman to head a top fashion title.
But the moves may also be too little, too late. The union blindsided Hearst Magazines when it announced in November that the “overwhelming majority”
of its 500 staffers had signed cards stating they wanted the Writers Guild to represent them at the bargaining table.
Young and Lewis had rankled many staffers for seemingly favoring digital over the much larger print side. There was likewise unrest over management’s failure to back former Esquire Editor-in-Chief Jay
Fielden on a controversial story about alleged sexually predatory behavior by Hollywood director
Bryan Singer.
Because of restrictions due to the coronavirus, the vote is being conducted entirely by mail. Ballots must be postmarked by July 13, and results of the vote are to be revealed no later than July 20. Awards delay
After losing more than half its board to a heated debate over racial inequality in the publishing world, the National Book Critics Circle said Thursday it will put its prestigious annual literary awards on hold until it gets its own house in order and attracts more diversity to its board.
“We hope to be in a position to present the NBCC awards for calendar year 2020,” the statement said. “However, we will put aside all reading and deliberation in order to focus on fulfilling and exceeding the action items in our Anti-Racism Pledge and Action Plan.”