It appears this blog is already getting a reputation. We asked a number of well known publicists and journalists to contribute to this column, but while a few have registered none of them have “gone all the way” and contributed anything. In fact, one scared rabbit (if America is a nation of sheep then fashion is an industry filled with scared rabbits) associated with 7thonSixth emailed me the other day to say that contributing to the column was “scary.” Translate “scary” to mean anyone who she feels makes critical comments directed at IMG on or about the running of 7thonsixth, but by inference also the questioning of Anna Wintour’s judgement in putting Sarah Jessica Parker on the cover of Vogue, and/or calling WWD and John Fairchild to task for blacklisting Pauline Trigere for so many years. “Scary’ is just another word for doing and saying politically incorrect things. This makes me a “loose cannon”; someone who cannot be trusted among and with the “almighty ones”.
It seems OK for members of media to hold up for ridicule or reproach the personal habits of the high & mighty of our industry (Page Six’s Richard Johnson has made a career of it and it never seemed to bother his wife Nadine Johnson whose pr firm represents many a fashion heavyweight), but God forbid you should question what they do in their jobs. Of course once these same people lose their high positions, then it is open season. It is not who you are but who you work for that counts. Yesterday you were an editor and everybody wants to know your opinion; today you are unemployed and your phone is dead and you are as good a dead. Anyone who has worked high up on a magazine masthead knows what happens when they lose their job. They will tell you it is the one sure way to find out who your real friends are!
