VICE APOLOGIZES
Hi. We screwed something up in the Iraq Issue a couple months ago. Hala Alsalman wrote the “Talk Like an Iraqi” piece and contributed to the “Iraq From A to Z.” She also wrote a profile of Saddam Hussein for us in 2002 (“Saddam Sux”) and was credited incorrectly, as Hala Khan. We’re sorry, Hala. It won’t happen again. Please stop not talking to us. REHAB READING
Dear Vice, A little over nine months ago I checked myself into rehab after a particularly bad weeklong run which ended with a crack-induced highway car wreck outside DC (I lived in Brooklyn). I’d recently had a series of bad incidents—an unexplained torn-up ankle (which I treated with three days of blow and old crutches rather than a doctor), losing a dream job after a record two days, getting asked to leave the neighborhood by the landlord, etc. This wasn’t real surprising stuff given the last ten-plus years, but at 28 it’s just not that cute anymore. Anyway, in the days before check-in and the crash, I had the presence of mind to remember your old “Vice Guide to Rehab.” I’m a guy so rather than dressing head-to-toe in Juicy Couture sweats I dropped my last $300 at American Apparel on stuff I wouldn’t be caught dead in anywhere else, but which made me feel like a king among zombies in my fancy Connecticut rehab. When I got my “rehab crush” I was able to think outside the context I was in and realize screwing a suicidal, bulimic, 40-year-old alcoholic is maybe not worth getting kicked out of a very expensive program for. More important than these incredibly useful tidbits was just reading something in a “voice” I could relate to. Pretty much everything I’d ever read or heard about addiction/recovery was just bullshit so, as someone who’d never tried to quit anything, I had no idea what I was getting myself into and was totally scared shitless. Having what I consider a normal person’s experience was invaluable. I didn’t (and still don’t) think getting drunk and doing some bumps a few times a week means you have a problem—in New York it seems a matter of course. But some of us can’t seem to do that and stay out of trouble. Rather than die or spend the rest of my life miserably wondering why it all didn’t work out (while friends are moving on to adulthood while still being able to party), giving sobriety a try doesn’t seem too bad. So thanks a ton for the guide, I totally recommend it to anyone who needs it. REHABO
Via email Glad to be of service. The hardest thing about rehab might be that you’re surrounded by human shit that will never really recover and just want to have a pissing contest over who did worse stuff when they were using. And if you’re trying to enter rehab after a certain age, say… 35, or if you are going into rehab for the fourth time no matter what your age, you should probably just resign yourself to dying a junkie so that the people who really have a chance of recovery can use the facilities. But we digress… TWO BITS
Dear Vice, In response to the letter from V14N4 “Ask Someone Who Cares Dept” [by the guy who didn’t know how to tell a girl not to use teeth when blowing him]: APPARENTLY YOU HAD A HARD TIME ALL AROUND EXPRESSING TO WOMEN WHAT YOU WANTED, LIKE JUST BEFORE JIZZING IN THEIR FUCKING MOUTH. THAT WASN’T TEETH-TACT, THAT WAS A GAG REFLEX. FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU. MERRY SUCKING YOUR OWN DICK. ME,
Binghamton, NY Again, one of those letters that does nothing more than puzzle us. Why did you need to send this? A response to a letter that was already an NPS (No-Point Story)? We are publishing this only as an artifact of our bewilderment. (Hey, that would make a good shitty album title… Artifact of Bewilderment.) HUMANS WITH IDEAS
Hey Vice, What’s going on? I see people sending you stupid shit all the time, so I thought I’d send you a legitimate pitch for a video idea I’ve been working on. See, I’m a writer, but I don’t know much about filming. Anyway, here’s my idea: I’ve always thought that it was stupid that movie critics seem to take movies and individually critique them. It’s like letting every person in the NBA shoot baskets on an empty court, and then deciding who is the “best” player. Why don’t critics have to look at things in context? It’s not like their job is hard. I’m a critic and a movie snob and I want to do it, but how? I’ve decided to watch IMDb’s 100 best movies, all at once, one after the other with no interruptions. It should take a little over eight days. I will not sleep on the job—I’ll eat on the job, I suppose I’ll have to shit occasionally, but other than that, 100 movies straight, no bullshit. Because I’ll start slowly going insane, I’m going to be bringing in 100 guests to talk about each movie with me. I’ve been trying to get directors, etc., to back me up on this for a while now, but it wouldn’t make for a good feature. It’s much too long, but I think it would be perfect for VICE TV. It could run for who knows how many episodes on your little TV screen. It could work. Anyway, if you like the idea, get back to me. If you steal it, I’ll sue you. Or try to. Oh, and nobody else can host the thing: It’s my idea, so I have to go the eight days without sleeping. See you later. STEVE ROBERTS
Via email We’re all set, thanks. Feel free to pitch your feature elsewhere. Maybe to Tiresome Boring Shitstain Monthly? They’re always looking for stuff like this. TO STOOPS OR NOT TO STOOPS?
Dear Vice, I was glad to see you declare an end to all that ridiculous, super-abbreviated teenspeak that’s been turning people’s voices into the internet for the past year, but I was a little curious how you planned to put that genie back in the bottle? Calling a moratorium is good for a larf but ultimately means nothing without some sort of enforcement. Might I recommend taking a page from the world of “guerilla marketing” and have street teams find and extend offending ’breviations on billboards and in publications? Actually I think it would be pretty awesome if some wealthy English nerd took things a step further and had some sort of graffiti squad who went and corrected the grammar on tags and signs and things, but still acted and spoke like regular graffiti kids, just with perfect diction. In any case, I think the slang’s already too deeply ingrained in this generation for anybody to pry it loose (there was even a joke about it on the 30 Rock last night, did you catch that?). And what’s more, I bet you anything that when I flip open the next copy of Vice, I catch a wayward “defs” somewhere in the fine print. Good luck with that rock, Sisyphus. BRAD MARSHALL
Upton, NY Challenge met: If we use one of those words in print again, you have permission to come to our office and shoot us. We even have a gun here you can use. Seriously, you can shoot us. Our address is right there, just below that little line.
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](mailto:stuff@viceaustralia.com)Letters are edited for length._**
Hi. We screwed something up in the Iraq Issue a couple months ago. Hala Alsalman wrote the “Talk Like an Iraqi” piece and contributed to the “Iraq From A to Z.” She also wrote a profile of Saddam Hussein for us in 2002 (“Saddam Sux”) and was credited incorrectly, as Hala Khan. We’re sorry, Hala. It won’t happen again. Please stop not talking to us. REHAB READING
Dear Vice, A little over nine months ago I checked myself into rehab after a particularly bad weeklong run which ended with a crack-induced highway car wreck outside DC (I lived in Brooklyn). I’d recently had a series of bad incidents—an unexplained torn-up ankle (which I treated with three days of blow and old crutches rather than a doctor), losing a dream job after a record two days, getting asked to leave the neighborhood by the landlord, etc. This wasn’t real surprising stuff given the last ten-plus years, but at 28 it’s just not that cute anymore. Anyway, in the days before check-in and the crash, I had the presence of mind to remember your old “Vice Guide to Rehab.” I’m a guy so rather than dressing head-to-toe in Juicy Couture sweats I dropped my last $300 at American Apparel on stuff I wouldn’t be caught dead in anywhere else, but which made me feel like a king among zombies in my fancy Connecticut rehab. When I got my “rehab crush” I was able to think outside the context I was in and realize screwing a suicidal, bulimic, 40-year-old alcoholic is maybe not worth getting kicked out of a very expensive program for. More important than these incredibly useful tidbits was just reading something in a “voice” I could relate to. Pretty much everything I’d ever read or heard about addiction/recovery was just bullshit so, as someone who’d never tried to quit anything, I had no idea what I was getting myself into and was totally scared shitless. Having what I consider a normal person’s experience was invaluable. I didn’t (and still don’t) think getting drunk and doing some bumps a few times a week means you have a problem—in New York it seems a matter of course. But some of us can’t seem to do that and stay out of trouble. Rather than die or spend the rest of my life miserably wondering why it all didn’t work out (while friends are moving on to adulthood while still being able to party), giving sobriety a try doesn’t seem too bad. So thanks a ton for the guide, I totally recommend it to anyone who needs it. REHABO
Via email Glad to be of service. The hardest thing about rehab might be that you’re surrounded by human shit that will never really recover and just want to have a pissing contest over who did worse stuff when they were using. And if you’re trying to enter rehab after a certain age, say… 35, or if you are going into rehab for the fourth time no matter what your age, you should probably just resign yourself to dying a junkie so that the people who really have a chance of recovery can use the facilities. But we digress… TWO BITS
Dear Vice, In response to the letter from V14N4 “Ask Someone Who Cares Dept” [by the guy who didn’t know how to tell a girl not to use teeth when blowing him]: APPARENTLY YOU HAD A HARD TIME ALL AROUND EXPRESSING TO WOMEN WHAT YOU WANTED, LIKE JUST BEFORE JIZZING IN THEIR FUCKING MOUTH. THAT WASN’T TEETH-TACT, THAT WAS A GAG REFLEX. FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU. MERRY SUCKING YOUR OWN DICK. ME,
Binghamton, NY Again, one of those letters that does nothing more than puzzle us. Why did you need to send this? A response to a letter that was already an NPS (No-Point Story)? We are publishing this only as an artifact of our bewilderment. (Hey, that would make a good shitty album title… Artifact of Bewilderment.) HUMANS WITH IDEAS
Hey Vice, What’s going on? I see people sending you stupid shit all the time, so I thought I’d send you a legitimate pitch for a video idea I’ve been working on. See, I’m a writer, but I don’t know much about filming. Anyway, here’s my idea: I’ve always thought that it was stupid that movie critics seem to take movies and individually critique them. It’s like letting every person in the NBA shoot baskets on an empty court, and then deciding who is the “best” player. Why don’t critics have to look at things in context? It’s not like their job is hard. I’m a critic and a movie snob and I want to do it, but how? I’ve decided to watch IMDb’s 100 best movies, all at once, one after the other with no interruptions. It should take a little over eight days. I will not sleep on the job—I’ll eat on the job, I suppose I’ll have to shit occasionally, but other than that, 100 movies straight, no bullshit. Because I’ll start slowly going insane, I’m going to be bringing in 100 guests to talk about each movie with me. I’ve been trying to get directors, etc., to back me up on this for a while now, but it wouldn’t make for a good feature. It’s much too long, but I think it would be perfect for VICE TV. It could run for who knows how many episodes on your little TV screen. It could work. Anyway, if you like the idea, get back to me. If you steal it, I’ll sue you. Or try to. Oh, and nobody else can host the thing: It’s my idea, so I have to go the eight days without sleeping. See you later. STEVE ROBERTS
Via email We’re all set, thanks. Feel free to pitch your feature elsewhere. Maybe to Tiresome Boring Shitstain Monthly? They’re always looking for stuff like this. TO STOOPS OR NOT TO STOOPS?
Dear Vice, I was glad to see you declare an end to all that ridiculous, super-abbreviated teenspeak that’s been turning people’s voices into the internet for the past year, but I was a little curious how you planned to put that genie back in the bottle? Calling a moratorium is good for a larf but ultimately means nothing without some sort of enforcement. Might I recommend taking a page from the world of “guerilla marketing” and have street teams find and extend offending ’breviations on billboards and in publications? Actually I think it would be pretty awesome if some wealthy English nerd took things a step further and had some sort of graffiti squad who went and corrected the grammar on tags and signs and things, but still acted and spoke like regular graffiti kids, just with perfect diction. In any case, I think the slang’s already too deeply ingrained in this generation for anybody to pry it loose (there was even a joke about it on the 30 Rock last night, did you catch that?). And what’s more, I bet you anything that when I flip open the next copy of Vice, I catch a wayward “defs” somewhere in the fine print. Good luck with that rock, Sisyphus. BRAD MARSHALL
Upton, NY Challenge met: If we use one of those words in print again, you have permission to come to our office and shoot us. We even have a gun here you can use. Seriously, you can shoot us. Our address is right there, just below that little line.
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