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Anna Wintour's gilded offices descended into chaos after a 'aggressive' transgender journalist confronted a HR executive for firing her non-binary lover. Alma Avalle was among four journalists fired by publisher Conde Nast after confronting head of human resources Stan Duncan about her beau Lex McMenamin's layoff from Teen Vogue on Wednesday. Avalle, a digital producer at food website Bon Appétit, was given the boot alongside Wired senior reporter Jake Lahut, Conde Nast entertainment videographer Ben Dewey and Jasper Lo, a fact checker at The New Yorker magazine. Conde Nast publishes those titles as well as other esteemed magazines including Vogue, GQ and Vanity Fair. The foursome took it upon themselves to gather outside Duncan's offices at Conde Nast's One World Trade Center headquarters in Manhattan, where they demanded to speak to him about cuts at Teen Vogue comprising half its 12 staff. Semafor reported that Duncan ordered the troublemakers to return to work, only to be asked if he was 'running away'. Duncan was then grilled by the unionized group about how he planned on standing up to the Trump administration. 'We'd like you to move forward,' an exasperated Duncan is said to have asked, prompting his entitled underlings to reply: 'We'd like you to answer our questions.' The Trump questions appears to have been in reference to McMenamin, who uses they/them pronouns and was Teen Vogue's political editor. Avalle and McMenamin are in a relationship, and even protested together outside of the skyscraper that houses their former employer last year. The two were also pictured together at the LGBTQ+ 'Them Now Awards' in New York City last June. McMenamin gushed on X about their 'beautiful girlfriend' who 'valiantly won Conde Nast's FIRST EVER union contract' in June 2024. Immediately after the incident, Conde Nast filed a charge against the National Labor Relations Board against the NewsGuild of New York. In it, they described the organization as having taken 'repeated and egregious disregard of our collective bargaining agreement'. A spokesperson added: 'Extreme misconduct is unacceptable in any professional setting. This includes aggressive, disruptive, and threatening behavior of any kind 'We have a responsibility to provide a workplace where every employee feels respected and able to do their job without harassment or intimidation. 'We also cannot ignore behavior that crosses the line into targeted harassment and disruption of business operations. 'We remain committed to working constructively with the union and all of our employees.' In her own statement posted to liberal social media Bluesky, Avalle complained that it was a 'transphobic' to describe her behavior as aggressive. She said: 'I was acting as a union member and concerned employee when I questioned Stan Duncan, well within my rights. 'I don't love pointing to my identity, but the company saying that I was behaving 'aggressively' when I was calmly asking questions feel like a clear transphobic dog whistle.' The NewsGuild of New York issued a statement on Thursday on the sacking of the four, branding the layoffs as 'illegal'. President Susan DeCarava said: 'Management's attempt at union-busting, using intimidation and grossly illegal tactics to try to suppress protected union activity will not stand.' In a post to his X, Lahut said: 'To take this in good faith: Sometimes, it's a good thing to stand up for your colleagues. 'We've gotta look out for each other, as competitive as this business is. And I was on the Condé Nast unit council, so it very much was our business.' The remaining Teen Vogue employees have found their roles folded into the more prestigious - but markedly less woke - Vogue magazine. This week's drama is the latest instance of Conde Nast's chickens coming home to roost after the publishing giant indulged woke excesses in the wake of George Floyd's June 2020 murder. In August this year, hateful anti-white posts written by The New Yorker journalist Doreen St. Felix sparked fury, but bosses there said nothing and continued to employ her. No such grace was afforded to other Conde Nast staffers who previously offended the publisher's in-house social justice mob. In March 2021, Teen Vogue fired its incoming editor-in-chief Alexi McCammond after racist and homophobic tweets she'd posted as a 17-year-old were unearthed. A ringleader of the effort to oust McCammond, social media manager Christine Davitt, was herself let go after it emerged she'd sent tweets using the n-word. In July 2020, Bon Appetit editor Adam Rapoport was fired over a photo of him dressed in a durag, baseball cap and chains in what woke journalist Korsha Wilson claimed was an act of racism. Anna Wintour, who was the inspiration for nightmare editor Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada, herself apologized the same summer for what she called 'race-related mistakes' during her then 32 year tenure at the helm of Vogue. The 76-year-old stood down as editor-in-chief of the fashion bible earlier this year but retains the title of global chief content officer at Conde Nast, meaning she remains the corporation's most powerful journalist.
