Gawker

Next month, my Great Uncle Charlie's gonna be on Vanity Fair playing Pitch with my Aunt Irene. EDGY.

I am waiting for the special Murder She Wrote commemorative issue.

Hope I die before I get on the cover.

Okay, on the count of three, let's declare using relevant/irrelevant, at least as Richard did, above, to be outplayed, overused, and nonsensical in the first place. And let's officially retire it. Ready? One, two, THREE.

I have never seen a less green cover in my life. It's like it's spraying bottles upon bottles of Aqua Net in my eyes.

Wilfred Brimley on horseback, post haste!

@zivah: So you're saying those terms are irrelevant?

So, if I understand this post correctly:
- Aging is a character flaw.
- Old people are icky.
- But baiting them is fun.
- Magazines should not cover subjects that do not interest Richard.
- To neutralize a fact that undermines your thesis, (Shia LaBeouf), just mention it at the end.

@Joy_Rebar: You forgot one:

- Your reading comprehension is lacking.

@zivah: Yes. And on the count of ten, let's proclaim that unilateral humourless prescriptions about what tropes we can use should be relegated to Jezebel comments and Nick Douglas posts.

Shia iss Cougar-bait.

Whoops! Accidental lisp!

"...Rather than trying to buck the demographic with edgier fare, Carter is just trudging along after the comfort-seekers. ..."

From what I've been told, Vanity Fair's editing practices routinely require writers to submit to endless fool's errand re-writes directed by imperiously vague editorial requests. (And slavish, uncomplaining compliance with these requests in no way guarantees that the piece will, in the end, run.)

In other words, the magazine beats the poo out of writers.

This isn't an editorial style that tends to foster "edgy" material or even new ideas. Better to go with "comfortable" material that will entail a familiar kind of hell than to explore something novel that will likely generate God-only-knows what kind of outlandish busy-work and crazy-making drudgery.

Say what you will, VF still gets the bigtime premium advertisers, bitchez. Although, oddly, no Armani phone ads.

As for being ageists, give it up, kids. Everybody gets old, if they're lucky.

Why this complaint now? When was Vanity Fair ever edgy? Back when Tina Brown was putting Princess Diana on the cover? Before Brown, the covers were black and white photos of people like Philip Roth and Italo Calvino. Now THOSE were the days.

Will I get executed if I say I kind of love that Madonna cover, though I'm burnin' up, burnin' up with hate for Graydon Carter? Yes? OK, irrelevant.

@TallulahSkankhead: I think she looks really good!

Next month: a cover of Annie shooting a cover of Graydon, Hitchens, & Bloomberg au fumé at the Waverly Inn.

It's not irrelevance, it's reflexivity that dooms VF.

@DorothyMantooth: I only hope I look that good at 40 something! Airbrushed or not. Excuse me while I do some sit ups.

Given the choice between buff middle-agers and Paris Hilton holding a chihuahua and looking vapid...I'd say Mr. Carter is onto something.

@DahlELama: Amen!

@DorothyMantooth: @roodles: I'd give up my 401K for my thighs to look like that for a month.

Madonna is the only middle-age woman in the history of photoshopping who needs her upper arms air-brushed to make them look less muscular.

I stopped reading it after back to back Hilton/Richie photo spreads. Talk about irrelevant, as an old, I wasn't confused, just appalled.

Madonna will never go out of style.