Vice (magazine)
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Vice is a free glossy magazine based in New York City that covers contemporary independent arts and youth culture. The magazine's readership is comprised of young postcollegiate bohemians, often labelled "hipsters." Known for its controversial content, it often strikes an ironic pose on debauchery, sex, drugs, violence, and social issues involving race and economic class.
Founded in Montreal, Canada by Suroosh Alvi, Shane Smith and Gavin McInnes, the magazine was launched as the Voice of Montreal in 1994 with government funding to provide work and a community service. When the editors wanted to break free of their commitments with the original publisher, Aliz Laurent, they bought him out and changed the name to Vice and moved to New York City in 1996.
After the move to New York, Vice began openly concentrating on vice. The magazine prides itself on being controversial and openly writing about taboo topics, which has garnered it both praise and condemnation. Particularly outlandish articles, such as The Vice Guide to Shagging Muslims and Bukkake On My Face: Welcome to the Ancient Tradition of the Japanese Facial have precipitated the magazine being banned from a number of university campuses, even while sharing page-space with earnest journalistic accounts on the war in Iraq, labor issues in the Third World, and the homeless.
The magazine is also famous for pioneering a feature that they call the "DOs and DONTs", which has since been imitated by other competing magazines. The feature displays candid photographs of strangers in public places accompanied with a short piece of commentary either ridiculing or praising the person's fashion and perceived sensibility. The idea has also been spun-off into a book, The DOs and DON'Ts Book, along with a compendium of the magazine's most popular work, The Vice Guide to Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll. Vice has also created a retail clothing chain, Vice Retail, and a record label, Vice Records, as well as nascent ventures like Vice TV and Vice Film.
As the result of publishing a string of articles aimed at opening a dialogue about immigration and environmental issues, Vice has been accused of using "irony" to conceal reactionary politics or to promote what some see as racist attitudes. In response to these criticisms, co-founder Gavin McInnes published an article attacking liberals in The American Conservative entitled "Hip to Be Square: It’s getting cooler to be conservative" in August 2003. McInnes later said the article was written as a joke.
In the past few years, the magazine's content seems to have shifted from dealing mostly with independent arts and pop cultural matters to covering more serious news topics, although both are often treated with the same spirit of blithe and caustic irreverence. They've recently championed the "Immersionist" school of journalism, which they regard as something of a DIY antithesis to the big-office methods practiced by traditional news outlets, and put out an entire issue composed of articles written in this manner. There have also been recent issues of the magazine wholly dedicated to concerns facing Native Americans, the mentally ill, and the mentally disabled written mostly by members of each group.
Vice has strong ties with hipster icons such as photographer Terry Richardson (who often shoots for them), clothing line American Apparel (a frequent advertiser), comedian David Cross (who contributes columns as well as hosting the Vice TV pilot, which was not picked up).
Today Vice publishes editions in Australia, Austria, Great Britain, the United States, Japan, Scandinavia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, Italy, the Netherlands, and Belgium. It is available for free and supports itself primarily through advertising.
[edit] External links
- Viceland - Official site.
- VICE Rumor Mule - VICE NY Office Rumors
- The Edge of Hip: Vice the Brand - New York Times article about the magazine.
- The VICE Guide To Travel DVD
