One major criticism of
Rolling Stone involves its generational bias toward the 1960s and 1970s. One critic referred to the magazine's "500 Greatest Songs" list as an example of "unrepentant
rockist fogeyism".
Rolling Stone has been criticized for reconsidering many classic albums that it had previously dismissed, and for frequent use of the 3.5-star rating. For example,
Led Zeppelin was largely written off by
Rolling Stone critics during the band's most active years in the 1970s, but by 2006, a
cover story on the band honored them as "the Heaviest Band of All Time". A critic for
Slate magazine described a conference at which 1984's
The Rolling Stone Record Guide was scrutinized. As he described it, "The guide virtually ignored hip-hop and ruthlessly panned heavy metal, the two genres that within a few years would dominate the pop charts. In an auditorium packed with music journalists, you could detect more than a few anxious titters: How many of us will want our record reviews read back to us 20 years hence?" The hiring of former
FHM editor Ed Needham in 2002 further enraged critics who alleged that
Rolling Stone had lost its credibility. The 2003 "100 Greatest Guitarists of all Time" list, which named only two female musicians, resulted in
Venus Zine answering with their own list, entitled "The Greatest Female Guitarists of All Time".
Rolling Stone film critic
Peter Travers has been criticized for his high number of repetitively used
blurbs.
Homosexual HIV story In 2003, the article "
Bug Chasers: The men who long to be HIV+" claimed that homosexuals who intentionally sought to be infected with
HIV accounted for 25% of new cases each year. However, the physicians cited in the article later denied making such statements.
Anti-vaccine article In 2005, the article "
Deadly Immunity", by
anti-vaccine activist
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., attracted criticism for quoting material out of context, and
Rolling Stone eventually amended the story with corrections in response to these and other criticisms.
Tsarnaev cover The August 2013
Rolling Stone cover, featuring then-accused (and later convicted)
Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, drew widespread criticism for "glamorizing terrorism", and was called a "slap in the face to the great city of
Boston". The online edition of the article was accompanied by a short editorial stating that the story "falls within the traditions of journalism and
Rolling Stones long-standing commitment to serious and thoughtful coverage of the most important political and cultural issues of our day". The controversial cover photograph that was used by
Rolling Stone had previously featured on the front page of
The New York Times on May 5, 2013. In response to the outcry, New England–based
CVS Pharmacy and
Tedeschi Food Shops banned their stores from carrying the issue. They were later joined by
Walgreens,
Rite Aid,
Kmart,
Roche Bros.,
Stop & Shop,
H-E-B,
Walmart,
7-Eleven,
Hy-Vee,
Rutter's Farm,
United Supermarkets,
Cumberland Farms,
Market Basket, and
Shaw's. Boston mayor
Thomas Menino sent a letter to
Rolling Stone publisher
Jann Wenner, calling the cover "ill-conceived, at best[...] [it] reaffirms a message that destruction gains fame for killers and their 'causes'." Menino also wrote, "To respond to you in anger is to feed into your obvious market strategy", and that Wenner could have written about the survivors or the people who came to help after the bombings instead. In conclusion he wrote, "The survivors of the Boston Marathon deserve
Rolling Stone cover stories, though I no longer feel that
Rolling Stone deserves them."
Defamatory false rape story and lawsuit On November 19, 2014, the magazine ran the story "A Rape on Campus", about an alleged
gang rape on the campus of the
University of Virginia. Separate inquiries by
Phi Kappa Psi, the fraternity accused by
Rolling Stone of facilitating the alleged rape, and
The Washington Post revealed major errors, omissions and discrepancies in the story. Reporter
Sabrina Erdely's story was subject to intense media criticism.
The Washington Post and
Boston Herald issued calls for magazine staff involved in the report to be fired.
Rolling Stone subsequently issued three apologies for the story. On December 5, 2014,
Rolling Stones managing editor, Will Dana, apologized for not
fact-checking the story. The magazine commissioned an outside investigation of the story and its problems by the dean of the
Columbia School of Journalism. The report uncovered journalistic failure in the UVA story and institutional problems with reporting at
Rolling Stone.
Rolling Stone retracted the story on April 5, 2015. The next day, following the investigation and retraction of the story, Phi Kappa Psi announced plans to pursue all available legal action against
Rolling Stone, including claims of
defamation. On May 12, 2015, UVA associate dean Nicole Eramo, chief administrator for handling sexual assault issues at the school, filed a $7.5 million defamation lawsuit in Charlottesville Circuit Court against
Rolling Stone and Erdely, claiming damage to her reputation and emotional distress. Said the filing, "
Rolling Stone and Erdely's highly defamatory and false statements about Dean Eramo were not the result of an innocent mistake. They were the result of a wanton journalist who was more concerned with writing an article that fulfilled her preconceived narrative about the victimization of women on American college campuses, and a malicious publisher who was more concerned about selling magazines to boost the economic bottom line for its faltering magazine, than they were about discovering the truth or actual facts." On November 4, 2016, after 20 hours of deliberation, a jury consisting of eight women and two men found
Rolling Stone, the magazine's publisher and Erdely liable for defaming Eramo, and awarded Eramo $3 million. On July 29, 2015, three graduates of the fraternity Phi Kappa Psi filed a lawsuit against
Rolling Stone, its publisher Wenner Media, and a journalist for defamation and infliction of emotional distress. The same day, and just months after the controversy began,
The New York Times reported that managing editor Will Dana was departing the magazine with his last date recorded as August 7, 2015. On November 9, 2015, the Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity filed suit for $25 million for damages to its reputation caused by the magazine's publication of the story, "with reckless disregard for the truth".
Rolling Stone paid the fraternity $1.65 million to settle the suit out of court.
Ethics controversy over El Chapo interview In 2016,
Rolling Stone commissioned
Sean Penn to write a feature on
Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán in what was billed as a landmark story and Guzmán's first-ever interview. Penn met Guzmán, then wanted by Mexican and U.S. authorities, at a jungle hideout for an interview, which was agreed to by Guzmán on the condition he have final editorial control over the article. Upon publication, the article, characterized by the
Associated Press as "long and rambling", was extensively mocked by social media users and prompted a discussion about the magazine's ethical standards. Andrew Seaman, chairman of the ethics committee of the Society of Professional Journalists, called the decision to allow a source pre-approval of an article "inexcusable", while the
Poynter Institute's chief ethicist Kelly McBride opined that the article evidenced several failures of editorial control by
Rolling Stone. In an interview with
NPR, Alfredo Corchado, a former
Mexico City bureau chief for the
Dallas Morning News, said that pre-approval rights meant the story was not real journalism: "It's business, it's Hollywood. It's more in the lines of what a public relations firm would do." Questions also arose as to whether relaxed security procedures by the magazine helped authorities track and capture Guzmán, who was arrested several days after the interview was conducted. Meanwhile,
Kate del Castillo, who arranged the meeting, said that she had to flee the country after the article's publication, and charged that Penn had "used me as a bait, and then he never protected me. And risked my life and my parents' life and my sister's life and everybody surrounding me." Penn later said his article "had failed", noting that discussion about the ethics of the story overshadowed the actual report.
False ivermectin story In September 2021,
Rolling Stone picked up a story published by
Oklahoma news outlet
KFOR which claimed that so many people had been hospitalized due to
ivermectin overdoses in Oklahoma that there was no room in
intensive care units for other patients, including those with gunshot wounds. However, an Oklahoma hospital said in a statement that there was no shortage of beds due to ivermectin overdoses, and the doctor who had been interviewed by KFOR had not said that ivermectin cases were crowding out other patients, but the initial story and subsequent coverage had linked separate comments about ivermectin overdoses and scarce beds.
CNN fact-checker
Daniel Dale stated that
Rolling Stone had "[run] an adaptation of the KFOR story without appearing to do sufficient research to make sure the local report was sound".
Rolling Stone subsequently added an editor's note that retracted the core point of its story.
Kyle Smith of
National Review called
Rolling Stone correction "so humiliating, it's a wonder the place doesn't shut its doors immediately, liquidate all assets, and deny that it ever existed."
Robby Soave of
Reason said that the correct story was "something
Rolling Stone could have figured out on its own had the magazine bothered to contact any hospitals in Oklahoma, but alas."
Taylor Hawkins article The magazine published an article on the death of
Foo Fighters drummer
Taylor Hawkins, which was strongly criticized by
Matt Cameron and
Chad Smith, who were quoted in the article under the belief that it would be a "celebratory.. retrospective."
James Gordon Meek child pornography case On January 31, 2023,
ABC News reporter
James Gordon Meek was arrested by the FBI and charged with transporting child pornography.
Rolling Stone initially broke the story, but did not mention the child sexual abuse images that led to the investigation, which were known to the reporters. Instead, it suggested that Meek had been "targeted" by the US government for his reporting on national security issues, writing that "Meek appears to be on the wrong side of the national-security apparatus". In the following months, it was revealed that
Rolling Stone editor
Noah Shachtman, who personally knows Meek and is considered friendly with him, had the story rewritten before publication to exclude all mentions of the child sexual abuse material, without the original journalist Tatiana Siegel's knowledge. ==In popular culture==