ATLANTA — When the Atlanta Hawks announced a promotional night in conjunction with an adult establishment, it initially didn’t cause much of a stir.
And as someone who has lived here for 13 years, I laughed and moved on with my day. Magic City Night for a game against the Orlando Magic? Makes all the sense in the world. Honestly, surprised they hadn’t been doing it annually. After all, they’re just promoting lemon pepper wings, right? (Wink-wink.)
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It’s one of those things where, if you’re from Atlanta, you get the joke. I would guess that while the vast majority of locals have never been to Magic City (me included), it would be rare to live in Atlanta without understanding its significance as a landmark (for better or worse). It’s more than just the infamous strip club every city’s residents can name, it’s the kind of place that has been lionized (again, for better or worse) in pop culture and celebrated (sometimes earnestly) for the quality of their chicken wings thanks in large part to former Hawk Lou Williams.
It’s distinctly Atlanta. And most people like the distinct things about their city, even if outsiders don’t get it. In other words, it’s a promotion meant exclusively for Hawks fans. An inside joke. If you know, you know.
Then social media got ahold of it. And the discourse on all sides went straight into the sewer.
When the Hawks decided to green light this project, they almost certainly did not expect that a blog post from a Western Conference center would spark a huge backlash, a backlash to the backlash, all kinds of awkward conversations about what constitutes culture in a place like Atlanta and bunch of annoying whataboutism over where the NBA draws the line.
Luke Kornet probably didn’t realize what he stepped into, either, when he asked the Hawks to cancel the promotion because it would “reflect poorly on us as an NBA community, specifically in being complicit in the potential objectification and mistreatment of women in our society.”
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But now that the horse is way out of the barn, at least give Kornet credit for this: He made me, and probably many others, at least think a little bit about whether it is appropriate for an NBA team to have a Magic City Night.
And he does have a point. It is questionable for a league that presumably wants to promote a family atmosphere at games to have a partnership with a strip club, even if the strip club part is not mentioned in any of the promotional activity. Yes, kids going to NBA games will be inundated with alcohol and gambling ads and probably hear some curse words in the stands. All of that is problematic, too.
But an 8-year-old asking daddy what Magic City is probably does not represent the ideal outcome for any parent taking their kid to an NBA game.
I also think Kornet’s case was overwrought.
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While people may have different values or views of the adult entertainment industry, Magic City is a legal establishment that provides jobs and serves customers. To suggest that any association with a strip club links the NBA brand to mistreatment of women, or that it’s shameful to work at a strip club, is both a stretch and a dangerous assumption.
After all, this is America: Isn’t a strip club that complies with the law and allows its employees to earn competitive wages just as honest as any other business?
Even granted all that, it’s OK to admit there’s no clear right or wrong answer whether the Hawks should be celebrating it. But ultimately, the reason why the Hawks aren’t backing away from this promotion, is because the team knows its fan base and its fan base knows the city.
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Atlanta is a big, diverse, interesting place and a typical Hawks crowd reflects its particular mix of being a hub for Black culture and entertainment while also being a base for numerous Fortune 500 companies. Whereas some franchises overtly market themselves to suburbanites, a Hawks game feels like an event where most people live or work in the city, where you’re just as likely to run into a rapper as a CEO. From having a float in the gay pride parade to repurposing State Farm Arena as a voting facility in 2020 to even something like the MLK alternate uniforms they wore a few years back, the Hawks lean into the stuff that makes Atlanta what it is.
That’s why this promotion just made sense to someone who knows the franchise. Whether Magic City is your kind of establishment or not, it’s a famous place in the city whose connection to the Hawks is sort of baked in. And it’s not like there are going to be strippers taking tickets at the door. But if that vibe isn’t for you, there are other games to attend.
It’s just not as deep as Kornet made it out to be. But the backlash to him, some of which has been funneled through a racial lens, has been equally unproductive. We don’t need to defend a strip club on the grounds of being an important cultural institution because it’s not. We don’t need to blame Kornet for how the NBA has handled actual domestic violence issues or whether some of its partnership choices chip away at the integrity of the league.
It’s just a fun night in Atlanta, for Hawks fans who embrace everything the city is, most of whom will never step foot in Magic City and enjoy the lemon pepper wings anyway.