Each year, N.B.A. teams put on hundreds of theme nights. They celebrate cultural heritage, veterans, Barbie, movies or cancer research. But in late February, the Atlanta Hawks announced an unusual theme night: Magic City Monday.
In the news release, the Hawks called Magic City an “iconic cultural institution,” which it very much is in the city of Atlanta. But it is also a strip club, known for its acrobatic dancers, its place in hip-hop history and a famous clientele, including many professional athletes.
In reaction to the announcement, the internet did what it does. Some commenters were amused. Some were offended. Hawks ticket sales swelled for the evening. So did pre-orders for special-edition black hoodies with “Magic City” written in peach on the front and the Hawks logo on one arm. Some said they were proud to see the institution supported by one of the city’s sports teams. Others, including the outspoken N.B.A. player Luke Kornet and local groups fighting sex trafficking saw it as an affront to women.
On March 9, one week before Magic City Monday, the National Basketball Association took the unusual step of canceling the Hawks’ promotion. (N.B.A. teams are generally free to schedule their own promotional nights without league approval for each individual event.)
And then the online discourse really exploded. Magic City Monday became a referendum on who and what should be celebrated publicly.
“It’s a really powerful litmus test to get a sense of what’s acceptable,” said Marcus Collins, a clinical assistant professor of marketing at the University of Michigan. Dr. Collins, who formerly worked as the head of digital strategy for Beyoncé, said the mere fact that the promotion had nearly happened showed that the taboo around strip clubs was softening.
Magic City has served as a cultural epicenter connecting celebrities, athletes and musicians for decades.
As hip-hop expanded from the East and West Coasts into the South, the club became a place where a spin from one of its influential DJs could propel a new song to the top of the charts. The club introduced new music for hip-hop stars like Future, Migos and Jeezy and helped popularize Atlanta favorites like Jermaine Dupri, Killer Mike and 2 Chainz.
Dominique Wilkins, a Hall of Famer who played for the Hawks from 1982 to 1994, was a famous patron in its early days, as was the football star Deion Sanders.
The Hawks’ Magic City Monday promotion was not going to include erotic dancing. Several concession stands were set to serve the club’s famous chicken wings, which include a flavor named after Lou Williams, a former Hawks player. Mr. Williams was famously observed visiting Magic City with the rapper Jack Harlow when he had been excused from the N.B.A.’s quarantine bubble in 2020 to attend a funeral.
“It was just chicken wings and a name, that was all going over there,” said Michael Barney, whose nickname is Magic. Mr. Barney founded the club in 1985. He now owns the building, but not the club, which is owned by Paradise Entertainment Group. “They said maybe we could use the Magic name over there to sell some hoodies and see if we can put out a special edition. Just hoodies and wings, that’s all.” He added, “They took it from Magic City wings to stripper, stripper. Every other word was ‘stripper.’ That’s how they beat you down.”
Whose idea was the promotion? “We don’t kiss and tell,” Mr. Barney said.
The Atlanta Hawks declined to comment. “Magic City’s not comfortable discussing the origination of this idea,” said Gary Freed, a lawyer representing the club and its ownership. “They’re very sorry that it didn’t go forward.”
The Hawks had planned a special halftime show by the rapper T.I., who was still scheduled to perform. There was also to be a live taping of a podcast featuring Mr. Barney and T.I., with an introduction by Jami Gertz, a co-owner of the Hawks. Ms. Gertz, who is also an actress, produced a documentary about Magic City that debuted last August. The Hawks linked to the film when the team announced the theme night.
A representative for Ms. Gertz did not respond to a request for an interview. Kafi Bolton, one of the club’s most famous dancers, who uses the stage name Gigi Maguire, was “ecstatic” when she heard about the promotion, she said. Mondays are typically a big night for the club because it is often when the club introduces new music.
“Everybody in Atlanta knows about Magic City Monday,” Ms. Bolton said. “Every celebrity in the world knows that Magic City Monday is a thing, the ball players themselves know that Magic City is a thing. I really didn’t see anything harmful about them celebrating that part of Atlanta culture.”
Monique Williams, a former Magic City dancer who went by the stage name Whyte Chocolate and was featured heavily in the documentary, thought the theme night was a great representation of what she deemed Atlanta’s true culture.
But, she added, it is not a culture that everyone in the city participates in. Ms. Williams said she probably would not have taken her own 11-year-old daughter to a basketball game celebrating the club.
“Hip-hop culture, nightlife, adult entertainment, it’s always been intertwined with pro sports,” Ms. Williams said. “But the league only embraces it when it’s sanitized enough for sponsors. Magic City, yes, it’s a brand, but it’s a salacious brand.”
Others had a harsher take.
Mr. Kornet, who plays for the San Antonio Spurs, wrote a short blog post urging the Hawks to cancel the promotion.
“Allowing this night to go forward without protest would reflect poorly on us as an N.B.A. community, specifically in being complicit in the potential objectification and mistreatment of women in our society,” Mr. Kornet wrote.
Al Horford, who spent the first nine years of his N.B.A. career with the Hawks, aligned himself with Mr. Kornet by sharing the post on X and adding, “Well said Luke.”
Groups that try to help victims of sex trafficking and exploitation also chimed in. A religious organization called Freedom Collective voiced its objection to the promotion on Instagram. In an email, the organization’s national director, Jeff Shaw, said the Freedom Collective’s position is that strip clubs are “inherently exploitative” because “they subject women to conditions that would be considered unacceptable in any other work environment.”
Mr. Kornet’s post infuriated Natalie Clark, who goes by NatsHoney and is the president of Strippers United, a labor organization for strippers.
“It was clear to me that it’s not that you’re thinking about us as workers, you’re just saying that we don’t belong in any traditional place within society,” Ms. Clark said in a phone interview.
After the event was canceled, the Freedom Collective and eight other organizations published a letter in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution thanking the league for stepping in.
“I’ve talked with traffickers that have said they have taken victims into strip clubs to strip before they were sold to desensitize them,” said Susan Norris, the founder of Rescuing Hope, an organization that helps sex trafficking victims, who signed the letter. She said the promotion would have been harmful to women who had experienced that, and said she also believes strip clubs are inherently exploitative.
In 2017, Magic City settled a lawsuit with 28 dancers who accused it of mishandling their wages. Last year, a dancer sued Mr. Barney and Paradise Entertainment Group, saying they violated minimum wage laws by requiring her to share a portion of her tips. She also said the establishment didn’t respond to her claims of sexual harassment by a female manager and then fired her in retaliation for complaining about both issues.
“I’m going to let the courts handle that one,” Mr. Barney said. “That’s just part of us doing business. We’re always going to have some ill-feeling people when they leave. A lot of the other clubs aren’t doing as well as Magic City so when you let a girl go now, back in the day it was all right. But now it’s almost like a divorce.” (Mr. Freed, the club’s lawyer, said that the establishment categorically denies the dancer’s claims.)
Mireille Miller-Young, a professor of feminist studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who focuses on race, sexuality and feminist politics, said the discussion about strip clubs is reflective of a split between feminists in the 1970s and 1980s over the issue of pornography — some argued that the porn industry exploited women and should be eradicated, while others said criminalizing the industry would not solve real problems of exploitation.
“I question any organizations that say that strip clubs are inherently exploitative, because that is not the case,” Dr. Miller-Young said. She said society doesn’t pay enough attention to the economic situations that would lead a person to choose sex work. She added, “But we can’t always assume that people are being exploited when they walk into a place of their own volition.”
Ms. Bolton, 46, who is now the general manager of a restaurant in Miami, said she didn’t find Magic City exploitative. She moved to Atlanta to escape an abusive relationship and said working there felt safe and helped build her self-confidence. She added that she loved the money, and made as much as $28,000 in a single night.
“You can go in there right now and see girls doing pole tricks that I created 20 years ago,” Ms. Bolton said. “I was the person that came in here and showed them that you can do more than just booty-clap and bend over. You can perform and entertain.”
The league didn’t give a reason for canceling the promotion, but in a statement, the commissioner, Adam Silver, said the league “heard significant concerns from a broad array of league stakeholders, including fans, partners and employees.”
The Hawks said in a statement that they were “disappointed” but respected the league’s decision. “As a franchise, we remain committed to celebrating the best of Atlanta — with authenticity — in ways that continue to unite and bring us all together.”
Canceling the event may have given Magic City more attention. Thilo Kunkel, a professor at Temple University’s school of sport, tourism and hospitality management, said Magic City’s Instagram account had added about 50 to 200 followers per day after the partnership with the Hawks was announced. But after the cancellation, the account was gaining about 1,000 followers a day.
“The cancellation itself was fantastic promotion,” Dr. Kunkel said.
Sheelagh McNeill contributed research.
Tania Ganguli writes about money, power and influence in sports and how it impacts the broader culture.
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