After alienating the poor with my savage attacks on them via the gas tax, I thought I'd go for another target today, the Greens - at least as they are seen by Mad Ave.
Actually, this comes from DeAnander, our frontpager in hiding at the European Tribune, which drops gems in comments deep, deep in threads. So come and find out about "Pretty People" and "Greens Who Dress Nicely"...
Out of curiosity to see what the clueless MSM were saying about peak oil and climate change I not only grabbed the PO issue of Am Prospect (which I dismissed contemptuously in an earlier thread for its touching, childlike faith in corn ethanol and Barack Obama) but also the seizure-inducing "Green Issue" of Vanity Fair -- a most aptly named mag if you actually remember the novel. VF is -- how to describe -- Hollywood Confidential meets Elle, or something like that. Am Prospect looks soberly realistic by comparison. And yet... for actual pages of relevant minatory content, VF might just win.
So, in the VF Green issue, the inside front page foldout (premiere spot) is a performance/luxury 'cute ute' ad. Ads continue for page after page of 4-colour offset (using toxic heavy-metal inks no doubt, on virgin dioxin-bleached claycoat): SUVs, perfumes, cosmetics, luxury handbags, more exotic cosmetics priced about the same as gold by troy weight, travel ads, gold jewellery, more travel ads, etc. Most of the affluent world's maximally destructive habits lavishly represented and promoted, before you ever get to any actual content. My ironometer is pegged already.
Now the articles, most of which boil down to "Pretty People Prefer Priuses," "Some Greens Dress Nicely and are Good Looking," and variations on these themes.
Plenty of snarky, snide, vicious little jabs at Birkenstocks, lentils, tie dye, tree hugging, and any critique of capitalism -- just so yesterday, m'dear. Trying to make it clear that Pretty Wealthy People Green-ness is a whole new, fashionable, stylish and above all upper-crusty thing, not some dreary shtick about, you know, serious ideas discussed by nonphotogenic vegetarian anoraks who drive old cars or godforbid ride a bike. Token third world activist -- just one -- Wangari Maathai. Everyone else seems white and 80 percent male. Feature pages: nifty expensive gifts to buy that are green or pseudo-green -- how to Keep Consuming Pointlessly with a Clear Conscience.
However, I give the editor his due -- in among all this incitement to grand mal he ran two excellent, lengthy, substantive feature articles: one on MTR (mountain top removal) coal mining in Appalachia, one on projected rises in sea levels. Both are excellent -- fact filled and chewy -- and I will try to scan some of the graphics to share. The mag as a whole though had about the same effect on me as the corpse of a diseased rat. I kinda don't even like touching it :-) Every pathology of the overripe zenith of American hyperconsumerism and narcissism, proudly flaunted in one shiny, garishly overcoloured, borderline-porno, pretty-shiny-toxic package. What an experience. What does it do to the brain to ingest one of these every month? Gotta drink some electrolytes, I'm in culture shock...
Question is, does the editor do a good strategic deed by slipping some serious content in among the big colourful bag of M&Ms and Qaaludes? getting an urgent message to people who would otherwise resolutely refuse to hear it? Or does he guarantee that the impact of these grim, hard-hitting articles will be lost, muffled in the layers and layers of corporate glitz and feelgood meringue in which he's wrapped them? The most serious (best contiguous page count and least conflict between text and graphics) layout was reserved for Junger's latest rubberneck art, an investigative essay on the Boston Strangler. Hmmm.