Molly McPherson critiques media framing of Kristin Cabot’s response to a viral incident. She contrasts the polished visual presentation in Cabot’s articles with the reality of a crisis, rejects blame-focused headlines, and walks through factors that amplified the episode (Cabot’s initial reaction, involvement of others like Andy Byron, a viral Chris Martin moment, and the company Astronomer).
I open up my morning app and I see this headline, and I think, not today, because I know I'm going to get media interview requests finished. Two of them. I will pass them along if they both make it to broadcast. But both wanted to talk to me about the response that Kristin Cabot put out in two articles. Curious. They said that they were exclusives, but no, there were two versions. She has hired someone, a strategic communicator. That's not me, because I do not agree with the take that they're doing here in the framing. But I will say optically, I love this look. I think we have the same shoes. She has a lot of the same clothes as me, but she has it in a much more elevated way. Now. If you look at all the photos in this article, it were Architecture Digest, you know, or some type of influencer thing, I would be all over this. But this is a woman who's in crisis. This is not a woman in crisis. This is a woman with a cute dog, great jeans, and our shoes. So the story by Lisa Miller, I actually listened to it, and Lisa Miller kind of chimed in with, you know, her takes before she got into the story, which I loved. Yeah, yeah, New York Times. I love that piece of it. Getting the perspective from the. From the reporter. But as a crisis manager, I'm looking at the intent behind the story. What are they strategically trying to do here? And then I always filter it through me, like, would I do this? And then I go, but what would I do? And then we look at the outcome. The framing that's happening here that they're trying to do is make this a story about shame. It's right in the headline framing it as Woman versus the Internet. But the framing misses the point because this headline means everything that happened is your fault. And you know me, I do not like it when in a crisis, you blame us. It's not our fault that you are in a crisis. Kristin admits that she made a mistake. She made a very human one. But what made the mistake explode was first, bad choices with alcohol with her boss, bad timing and bad luck. And Chris Martin viral moment that also took place during the summer where it's a slow news cycle. Her luck was awful that night, but the first thing was her reaction. She did this. The second thing was that Andy Byron ducked. You can't blame them for that. But that's part of the reason why it went viral. The second finger that we're pointing goes to Astronomer, the company. Company.
