Year in review: UU World’s most-read stories of 2017

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Year in review: UU World’s most-read stories of 2017

Our news coverage—especially of the hiring practices controversy and the resignation of UUA President Peter Morales—drew the most attention this past year.

Christopher L. Walton

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Five of UU World’s ten most-read stories in 2017—and eight of the top twenty—were news articles about the Unitarian Universalist Association’s hiring practices controversy, which erupted in March and dominated UU conversation for the next three months. Even though most of our readers still depend on the print edition of the magazine, it is gratifying to the editors that our news stories—which appear first online before being abridged for the print magazine—drew so much attention this year. Twelve of the top twenty most-read stories were news articles.

If our traffic is any indication, our readers were especially interested in articles about racism: Four of the eight non-news stories that drew the largest audiences are explicitly about it (and two were from our archives)—and the hiring practices controversy was for many people fundamentally about institutional racism and white supremacy. More than half of our most-read stories addressed racism or institutional responses to racism.

Finally, five of our top twenty stories this year came from the vault—either stories we promoted from years past or that continue to draw their own attention, thanks to the power of search engines and social media.

Here is our year-end traffic report:

  1. UUA President Peter Morales resigns amid controversy over hiring practices, by Christopher L. Walton (News, 3/30/17)
  2. Critics see white supremacy in UUA hiring practices, by Elaine McArdle (News, 3/27/17)
  3. Susan Frederick-Gray elected UUA president, by Christopher L. Walton (News, 6/24/17)
  4. Was your town a sundown town? by James Loewen (Essay, Spring 2008)
  5. Updates to presidential resignation and controversy over hiring practices, by Christopher L. Walton (News, 4/1/17)
  6. Moving beyond ‘whites only’ UU theology, by DeReau K. Farrar (Ideas, 6/19/17)
  7. Two more UUA senior staff announce they will step down, by Elaine McArdle (News, 4/5/17)
  8. Three co-presidents to lead UUA until General Assembly 2017, by Elaine McArdle (News, 4/11/17)
  9. Do all religions share a common thread? by Dan Harper (Ideas, Fall 2010)
  10. Two UUA employees violently robbed in New Orleans, by Christopher L. Walton (News, 6/30/17)
  11. Forgotten story of America’s whites-only towns, by Dan Carter (Bookshelf, Winter 2007)
  12. Largest UU church votes to move downtown, by Kenny Wiley (News, 5/29/17)
  13. Further updates to UUA resignations and controversy over hiring practices, by Christopher L. Walton (News, 4/8/17)
  14. Poem: Benediction for the heavy heart, by Mason Bolton (Spirit, Fall 2017)
  15. Citing ‘significant health concerns,’ UUA Moderator Jim Key resigns, by Elaine McArdle (News, 5/13/17)
  16. Early Christians emphasized paradise, not crucifixion, by Rita Nakashima Brock and Rebecca Parker (Feature, Summer 2008)
  17. In resigning, some UUA staff received ‘shocking’ severance, by Elaine McArdle (News, 6/16/17)
  18. Morales: ‘It was clear I had lost credibility and trust,’ by Elaine McArdle (News, 4/5/17)
  19. The black hole in the white UU psyche, by Mark Morrison-Reed (Feature, Fall 2017)
  20. A story of light and darkness, by Erica Baron (Essay, 12/21/15)

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