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NewsPitchfork kept the Win Infidelity story on the front page for 39 Days (August 27-October 5) Despite Bigger, Worse Stuff Happening (self.arcadefire)

submitted by WeExpectBetter101

I know a lot of people will downvote this because they disagree with Win's actions, and I am not here to defend his behavior or issue excuses. This is about the timing and persistent nature of the story on Pitchfork's front page. This was a deliberate smear on an indie hero, who had explicit permission from his wife to engage in extra-marrital affairs. The accusations were all directly responded to by Win in the article, and all of those involved were of legal age and sound mind.

The story was published August 27th, and has been kept at the top of their "More From Pitchfork" News category directly below the music "Reviews" section. It had not once left the top left position, which is the topmost position on the mobile site, until this afternoon (October 5th).

It appears that Pitchfork timed this article's release to directly coincide with the Arcade Fire European Tour & they have kept this article on their front page for every day, for over a month. I have read Pitchfork weekly since like 2008, and I have never seen them keep a story on top of their feed like this.

There have been numerous stories detailing far more egregious, acts (R. Kelly's ch*ld sexual endangerment, Michelle Branch's domestic violence, PNB Rock's murder, etc.) that Pitchfork has let come and go within 24 or 48 hours. But a rockstar having consensual relations and/or sending sexual texts with fans? That somehow is more important news.

As of 8am this morning it was still live on their page, but I checked just now (1:00pm in the afternoon) and it has finally been moved from the front page.

Timeline (Click Date for the Wayback Archives)

Aug 27 - Pitchfork publishes their article attacking Win (Article A), which remains at the top of their main page until

August 30 - Pitchfork publishes that Feist is donating all merch proceeds to Domestic Violence victims (Article B) & Moves Article A to the sidebar "The Latest"

September 1 - Pitchfork publishes that Feist is leaving the tour (Article C). Article A remains on the sidebar/The Latest.

September 8 - Article A is still on the sidebar. All other stories on the sidebar are from September 6 or 7.

September 13 - Article A finally moves from "The Latest" side to the top, leftmost spot (aka the first story in the) "More from Pitchfork" section where it will remain for 23 more days.

September 23 - Still up.

September 30 - Still up.

October 5 - Still up as of this morning, 11:00AM. Update: finally down.

TL:DR

I believe that Pitchfork timed the release of this article to negatively affect the European leg of the Arcade Fire tour, and then kept the article up longer than every single other story—not for clicks, but to try and make a lasting negative impression on Arcade Fire for Pitchfork's userbase.

Instead of shuffling the story down through their page, like they do with literally every other story, they kept this higher up & in the one of the most eye-catching positions on their front page (top/left, never moved down from there). Whatever your thoughts on Win using his power to hook up with his fans, I think we can all agree that this was an odd and aggressive way to keep the story afloat. Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

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[–]WRITINGAPOEM 135 points136 points  (6 children)

They kept it on there so long because it’s an exclusive story to Pitchfork and they want to reap the benefits of the traffic in order to increase ad revenue. 90% of what they publish is barely journalism, it’s music reviews and aggregation of music industry news. But occasionally they publish their own journalism and obviously felt very proud of this “scoop” as it likely was one of their biggest stories for traffic in awhile.

[–]teadrinkerboy 21 points22 points  (3 children)

I agree with the clicks and traffic thing. But what’s weird is that this has been removed just a few days after the tour finished. Like it had to be there during the tour or something

And is it really a bigger click generator than the R Kelly stuff?

[–]WRITINGAPOEM 35 points36 points  (1 child)

No it’s not bigger than the R Kelly stuff. The difference is Pitchfork didn’t have the R Kelly story by themselves.

I am not 100% researched on how that story broke, but everyone was reporting the R Kelly news and I’m not sure who had the exclusive, if anyone even did. That means the traffic was spread among all news sources fairly equally.

In this case Pitchfork did months of original reporting — which is expensive — and ultimately published information no other news source had, so anyone who reported on it had to link to their story and cite them.

In terms of actual news, the Win allegations were a relative nothingburger. It was big gossip but with relatively little weight behind the accusations. Nothing criminal was even close to being alleged, unlike R Kelly.

So in this case, Pitchfork was sitting on a story they pretty much owned 100% and no other news outlet had incentive to try to dig much deeper. Thus it was particularly valuable to them as a piece of content and they probably made a call to leave it on the home page (which helps SEO) for the duration of the tour, which is when most people were likely going to be googling Arcade Fire.

[–]rfamico 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Great analysis. I noticed that the story is now missing from Google news results. Not sure how that works; if the crawl just pulls from websites' frontpages.

[–]kidEno 6 points7 points  (0 children)

One would assume that fans would be more interested in articles about bands that they’re about to see live. You may not listen to a band for a year, but if they have a show coming up…

[–]WeExpectBetter101[S] 5 points6 points  (1 child)

As I stated on another comment—I took that fact into consideration, and while that definitely justified a week or two of keeping it afloat, 39 days is fucking insane of 'em.

Much bigger stories broke on much bigger artists that Pitchfork has worked with/covered (e.g., Pitchfork had R Kelly headline their music festival), and while not fully "exclusive" scoops, they were gone within a few hours of being published. On the other hand, 39 days is 936 hours.

[–]WRITINGAPOEM 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Yeah but you explained it yourself well - Pitchfork had R Kelly as a festival headliner as he was raping kids. That is a huge stain and embarrassment on their brand. They wouldn’t want to keep those stories up for long.

The Win accusations on the other hand allow Pitchfork to play the “hero” journalist role as they were the publication exposing the allegations. It’s something they want to trumpet and shout at the world.

[–]joemontanya 11 points12 points  (1 child)

I found a lot of good music through pitchfork as a kid… but they are so pretentious. A lot of their picks for “best albums” doesn’t even line up with what sounds good imo

[–]dennythedoodle 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I wouldn't trust Pitchfork's musical opinions at all. Many of their reviews don't age well at all. Weezer "Pinkerton" and MGMT "Congratulations" are two big examples of them shitting on a band for the clicks.

[–]Shantashasta 53 points54 points  (0 children)

The allegations were between 3.5 and 5.5 years old as well iirc. Not an urgent story clearly it was timed for the tour to get clicks.

[–]bentendo640 25 points26 points  (1 child)

Was on there yesterday wondering why a month-old article was still featured on the homepage. Lol

[–]WeExpectBetter101[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I've been keeping my eye on this every day, and was waiting for it to be taken down to say something. I wanted to see how far they'd go, and didn't want to spook them.

[–]Hipster_Blister 21 points22 points  (1 child)

This article was such a huge disappointment all around. As for any victims, I feel sorry that they were misrepresented for the sake of clickbait's. Reporting on people being preyed upon for monetization instead of the sake of good faith journalism. Pitchfork should be ashamed.

Also the fact that this story tried to take off but gained almost no traction gives credence to what Win was saying was in fact true. I do not think he is totally off the hook but this whole experience could be the turning point the band has needed for a long time both artistically and personally.

[–]Dream_in_Cerulean 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Yeah, I think that if there was traction to this story, many other people would have come forward by now. You would not see random people on reddit practically begging for other people to come forward, replying to year-old posts, and trying to dredge up additional info.

[–]Dream_in_Cerulean 7 points8 points  (0 children)

What is up with the equally long, total social media and media hiatus from the band? I can understand shutting things down for awhile, but isn’t this prime promotional time? When does their contract with the label end? I feel like there are a lot of unknowns behind the scenes here.

[–]Glad-Spell-3698 11 points12 points  (2 children)

Honestly more disappointed if there is truth to the victims story. Feist dropping from the tour provides validity to the claims imo. Overall not a good look for Win. It’s just sad to see a band I’ve loved since their first album and EP be the “bad guy.” So much of their music was apart of my life - seeing them multiple times, buying merch and just a constant music source. It’s honestly making me reconsider going to their concert. Too many celebrities get away with this behavior - and the victim blaming is disturbing.

Cue the downvotes 🫡

[–]dennythedoodle 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Feist dropping doesn't give any validity toward the claims. She just doesn't want her name associated with the band (which is totally reasonable by the way).

[–]mtofsrud 5 points6 points  (1 child)

I hate Ptchfork. Pure trash. Not because of this, but because....well everything.

[–]ilovethejoy 3 points4 points  (0 children)

#fuckpitchfork

[–]kajikiwolfe 19 points20 points  (1 child)

You really buried the lede with your post. I don’t think most people care about Win’s infidelity…

[–]smellybassist 16 points17 points  (0 children)

right? why are people so desperate to defend a gross guy who won’t ever care about them

[–]Dream_in_Cerulean 9 points10 points  (1 child)

I just hope that now that it is gone from the Pitchfork page and from Google News results that maybe we will actually get the Rabbit Hole single and remix and any other planned B-Sides or whatnot. Fingers crossed.

[–]ilovethejoy 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Fuck Pitchfork

YES PLEASE Rabbit Hole

[–]murkler42Eye 27 points28 points  (4 children)

I would say half of the reason is that they were the ones who did the research/interviews and broke the story, but also that, yes, it's been clear for a while Pitchfork has been anti-Arcade Fire and want to be the instigator of their demise, just as they were the propagator of their rise.

Not saying I am pro or anti Win Butler, just stating how it's appeared to me for the last few years.

[–]Shantashasta 24 points25 points  (0 children)

Early on they were big Arcade fire boosters. You know what they say though "they build it up just to burn it back down"

[–]GreenPlasticWaterCanCity with No Children 5 points6 points  (0 children)

They've done a bad job on writing a piece they researched themselves.

[–]WeExpectBetter101[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I took that into consideration, and while that definitely justified a week or two of keeping it afloat, 39 days is fucking insane of 'em.

[–][deleted]  (3 children)

[deleted]

    [–]Altoids101 7 points8 points  (0 children)

    Found the "Jet - Shine On" fan account admin

    [–]WeExpectBetter101[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

    & fuck Condé Nast.

    [–]Blips150Eye 1 point2 points  (0 children)

    Side note: Make another account and keep track of who Fantano enjoys hating on

    But, yes, fuck Pitchfork

    [–]JHutch95 2 points3 points  (0 children)

    It's difficult to really judge without knowing what the click through rate was. If it was consistently performing well CTR wise even weeks after it was published then yeah ,of course they'll keep it up front and centre; they rely on ad revenue + as mentioned it was a big exclusive. If there was a big drop off in the past few weeks however and they persevered with keeping it there, then yeah it's a bit more sinister of them.

    [–]ilovethejoy 9 points10 points  (0 children)

    I kept writing that this article and the way Pitchfork handled it seemed like a personal vendetta. Since I stopped reading their site I had not noticed what you mention here. Even more proof that there has to be a vindictive or control "We make you We break you" power play.

    [–]suburban_paradise 16 points17 points  (0 children)

    This, plus the 90’s lists are an absolute abomination. Fuck that site. The editor in chief ruined a great product.

    [–]KillerCheeze439 14 points15 points  (6 children)

    I feel bad for ones that misread that article and didn’t attend the gigs on principle. This article always felt like a witch-hunt based on nothingness.

    [–]Deweycox1090 2 points3 points  (0 children)

    It was a very poor piece of journalism. To every accusation in the story there's a counterpoint. There are no Damning texts provided. It's more of a he interpreted one way, she another. There's no rape or predator behavior. What predator sends a drunk fan home because she's too intoxicated? The one woman didn't remember if his hand was down her pants or outside her pants? The women felt uncomfortable or violated then continued going to his shows and texting him? It's obvious he's had problems and isn't the smoothest operator. He used his position as a famous musician to get laid. He went after women half his age. He's married and the women felt regret, confusion and were disgusted with his actions. Fair enough. He should be ashamed and i believe he is. Women use their beauty and charms to manipulate men constantly. Everyone uses what they have. Women who know what they have are the most powerful creatures alive.

    Unfortunately generation z needs to realize that musicians are flawed people. We shouldn't admire them for their politics and we don't listen to them based on their moral character. It's all about the music. Anyone who'd expect a musician to be anything but a narrsasistic borderline psychopath needs to wake up.

    [–]SeveralMushroom7088 6 points7 points  (4 children)

    Accusations of sexual misconduct from multiple women is 'nothingness'?

    Wow...what has this place sub become?

    [–]KillerCheeze439 5 points6 points  (3 children)

    A place where we can read for ourselves and make a judgement, not react hysterically to a smear campaign based off a headline.

    [–]SeveralMushroom7088 3 points4 points  (2 children)

    is it a smear campaign because the subject is your idol, perhaps?

    [–]KillerCheeze439 1 point2 points  (1 child)

    He’s far from my idol, he’s a bit of a douche. It’s a smear campaign because of how it’s been handled based on hearsay.

    [–]SeveralMushroom7088 4 points5 points  (0 children)

    how was it hearsay?

    [–]rileyelton 2 points3 points  (0 children)

    there only relevance now comes from breaking Me Too stories about musicians.

    [–]Darkwinged_Duck 17 points18 points  (0 children)

    I already can’t forgive pitchfork for the way they treat my boys in Weezer.

    [–]SeboSte 4 points5 points  (0 children)

    It’s barely even a story-smear piece is a better term

    [–]le_indernet 2 points3 points  (4 children)

    I think what's weirder than that, is that I haven't seen at least two big names in the social media space of music talk about this: Fantano and Middle 8 (who is also a big fan of Arcade Fire). They are both Youtubers whose contents I watch (though I don't really like Middle 8's stuff tbh) and apart from them Idk about anyone else who I watch who I'd expect to have heard about this story The one thing I know is that on Instagram, I think I remember having seen it at least being mentioned in the story of two major (meme) accounts: theokayestcomputer, and pageformusicchads (who btw doesn't like their music, not that this changes anything). I just feel like it should've made a bigger impact? Maybe I don't follow the kind of people who react to this stuff as much as I thought they would, but it's just weird to me. Now this post just seems to say that at least one music review website tries hard to tell everyone about it (although they were the one who found out about it first I guess).

    Idk, I feel like this story has had the most impact on the Arcade Fire subreddit from what I've seen, but on everyone else not so much, even though it might be useful to know about this when someone listens to their music

    [–]DontGetNEBigIdeasAfterlife 13 points14 points  (3 children)

    Part of the reason the article didn’t get a ton of traction is that it was really, REALLY poorly written.

    They purposefully mixed in allegations and facts, texts and verbal accusations, and treated them all as proof. They claimed to have texts supporting some accusations, but then later said the texts supported all the allegations.

    And, at least one of the victims has a shaky story. First Win put his hands in their pants; then, Win denies that, and the victim says okay maybe it wasn’t in their pants. That victim then proceeds to go to Win’s DJ set well after these awful things happened to them, saying they should “get something out” of the relationship.

    And, Pitchfork published that is if it was proof against Win, and not in the interest of being fair and balanced and acknowledging that at least one of the victims had a problematic story.

    They also treated the sexual assault part (where Win is accused of jamming his tongue down their throat) as fact, despite Win denying it and there being no texts to back it up.

    As usual: not supporting Win or calling the victims liars — but, the “journalism” here was suuuuper shoddy, and that probably explains why you didn’t see this outside this sub.

    [–]Dream_in_Cerulean 8 points9 points  (2 children)

    And, at least one of the victims has a shaky story. First Win put his hands in their pants; then, Win denies that, and the victim says okay maybe it wasn’t in their pants. That victim then proceeds to go to Win’s DJ set well after these awful things happened to them, saying they should “get something out” of the relationship.

    I agree that the article deliberately sought to confuse the audience and mix fact and allegation. Even you are mixing up the stories here. The individual who had the pants story was a different person than the person who went to Win's DJ set.

    https://www.reddit.com/r/arcadefire/comments/x7ocxi/chart_of_allegations/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

    I had to make a chart to clearly sort the four individual stories and identify what was being said. Once you sort them into separate allegations, the whole scope of the story loses weight, IMO. Not much to a story of twenty-something women consensually sexting a rock star who is in an open marriage, but that is all a lot of it is.

    [–]DontGetNEBigIdeasAfterlife 4 points5 points  (1 child)

    Yeah, and even more to my point that some of these stories are suspect that there are 2/4 victim’s who have questionable responses to this.

    [–]Dream_in_Cerulean 9 points10 points  (0 children)

    Right. Two of the four are fully adult women who admit they engaged in consensual online interactions, and only saw the interactions negatively in hindsight. The one 18 year old was sent home in a cab when she got too drunk, and requested free tickets to an Arcade Fire show a year later despite the supposedly unwanted sexts. The other individual was also an adult, with a changing story, and (IMO) events that could largely be explained as mixed signals in early dating. There just isn't a lot there. But the way the article was written resulted in all these claims of him inappropriately touching 18 year olds, something that was never reported and never happened according to anyone.

    [–]Other-Might-7376 2 points3 points  (0 children)

    It was a shitty article that almost seemed like an intentional smear piece. The closer you look at it, the more you can see how they slanted and manipulated the accounts to bring Win down. I always believed Win’s version of events. I feel sorry for the band, pissed at Pitchfork, and I miss hearing my favorite group on XM radio.

    [–]markeydusod 4 points5 points  (0 children)

    I will say this, if it’s aim was to affect the tour on Europe, it definitely did not work

    [–]my_middle_leg_smiles 14 points15 points  (1 child)

    They "made" Arcade Fire and have decided to unmake them.

    It's not working.

    They are so woke and cater to a woke community that values ART only if it is WOKE ART whatever the fuck that is....

    ART does not require THE ARTIST to be anything.

    People that suddenly hate the ART they loved based on the ARTIST are free to leave. But THE ARTIST should not be compelled to stop making ART.

    If you were alive in the 40s, 50s, 60, 70s, 80s, 90s you would have NOBODY to listen too by today's ridiculous cancel culture.

    Win has been an asshole since day one. If you didn't know that you have never paid attention and certainly haven't been around him in the early days.

    Get over it. Or don't.

    I've been in since BEFORE Funeral....im not leaving

    So fuck pitchfork. I'll see you all in CHICAGO

    [–]dxrebirth 1 point2 points  (0 children)

    I want to see y’all in Chicago but got damn these ticket prices won’t come down at all

    [–]ilovethejoy 1 point2 points  (0 children)

    and also what u/WeExpectBetter101 mentioned- when there is Bigger, Worse Stuff Happening around the world.

    [–]iistke 4 points5 points  (0 children)

    Where did it say he had explicit permission?

    [–]SeveralMushroom7088 3 points4 points  (2 children)

    Peak mental gymnastics being performed in this thread. Wow.

    Who knew it would be Arcade Fire fans of all people who bent over backwards to protect someone accused of sexual misconduct by multiple people?

    Fandom is a crazy thing...

    [–]Grogonfire 0 points1 point  (0 children)

    Its so bizarre to me seeing Arcade Fire fans on here shout about "cancel culture" and "wokeness". Like are they accidentally listening to Ted Nugent instead?

    [–]Archamasse 0 points1 point  (0 children)

    I think, from speaking to friends of mine who have been hardcore AF followers since the EP/very early Funeral days, a lot of the longtime fans were also the most bothered by this, and have already bailed.

    So you're left with the self selected mental gymnastics gang telling each other how fine it all is because nobody else still wants to think about this douche anymore.

    [–]ad320011 4 points5 points  (3 children)

    I know this news was disappointing, but you are REALLY reaching here. If you believe Win has done nothing wrong, then why do you care if others read the article? It's already been published, people can make up their mind if they chose to support this behavior or not.

    [–]Glittering-Owl22 7 points8 points  (1 child)

    Nobody said he has done nothing wrong, it's just that the whole story has been blown up way out of proportion. And what he did was not a crime, from what is known so far. If acting like an ass gets you cancelled, half the population would be out of a job.

    [–]onanoc 7 points8 points  (0 children)

    Pitcfork reviewers firs, if you read how they vomit their personal opinion on artists without even having a grasp for the music on some of their album reviews.

    [–][deleted]  (1 child)

    [deleted]

      [–]WeExpectBetter101[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

      100% not an algorithm, imo.

      While editorial choices might be based on clicks/relevant content, I watched as they moved around pieces all over the More From Pitchfork section while this story stayed put, top-left.

      [–]Specialist_Pilot_558 2 points3 points  (0 children)

      The whole thing was a pathetic joke. Hope he uses it for inspiration. Trying to destroy a man because your feelings got hurt

      [–]Radio_Ethiopia 0 points1 point  (0 children)

      Yeah, I noticed that too.

      [–]EN1009 -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

      We really arguing this? Yeesh, who cares

      [–]ostsillyator -2 points-1 points  (5 children)

      There should be no shame for the crime info spreading if the crime itself literally exists, no matter how "better" it is when compared with others. Not to mention that Win didn't get the "explicit permission" to have sex outside of marriage, and he is far from being an "indie hero". I'd say it's better to persuade him to be less arrogant and think less of how to excite his dick next time he sees any of his female fans, than to be disappointed by a truth revealing media article.

      [–]onlyarcadefireCold Wind 4 points5 points  (4 children)

      Your use of the terms "truth" and "crime" don't quite match up to reality.

      [–]ostsillyator -5 points-4 points  (3 children)

      covering up eyes and ears and pretending that nothing ever happened doesn't really make nothing ever happened in reality

      [–]Glittering-Owl22 5 points6 points  (2 children)

      Something did happen, nobody denies that, I think. But a lot of people feel that no crime happened, as far as we know. I never really looked up to Win in the first place, so maybe this information does not affect me as much. I still love that band and their music.

      [–]ostsillyator 2 points3 points  (1 child)

      I also don't appreciate Win Butler as a person but enjoy Arcade Fire's music. I still listened to Arcade Fire as usual after the matter, because I never had high expectations for Win's morality (given his douche behaviors before). My main confusion over the remarks in this post is that, should we the fans really get irritated at Pitchfork for keeping articles against Win on their front page, and even begin to justify Win having the "explicit permission" for extramarital sex, act as if Pitchfork persecuted Win Butler out of nothing? I mean really, it's barely been over one month, are we really going to start reshaping the public memory this soon?

      [–]Glittering-Owl22 2 points3 points  (0 children)

      I think OP really just wanted to see this from a different angle, as the whole sad affair has already been discussed so much. I don't see public memory reshaping, I think most people did not see such a big deal in this story from the beginning. More like rockstars will do rockstar things.

      [–]writerintheory1382 -4 points-3 points  (0 children)

      They should keep it up as long as they want. It shouldn’t be this easy for a likely sexual predator to continue to profit and have a great life.

      [–]PhotoThoughts 0 points1 point  (0 children)

      Why is pitchfork not putting Kanye on blast? Is that newsworthy enough to keep up on the main page?

      [–]1canmove1 0 points1 point  (0 children)

      I can say with certainty that this is most read, clicked, whatever longform that pfork has posted in its 20+ year history. It’s also the only article that will have all of the most detailed information from both sides because it’s an exclusive. And a lot of people are still reading it everyday.

      So basically the reasons are practical. It’s not to do more damage to him because that damage is already done. Was that article in any way a part of a personal vendetta for the editors? Quite possibly, but we don’t know for sure.

      [–]maoore 0 points1 point  (0 children)

      “finally down”

      it is one of the biggest music stories of the year for pitchfork