Vice Mail

LIES, LIES, LIES, YEAH
Hey,

In your story on the Worms STD, you quote two sources that yield exactly zero results when you plug them into Google. Maybe you meant the Lower East Side Harm Reduction Center? Then how come nobody there (yes, I called) has ever even heard of Lisa Burton or Ron Goldberger or anything even resembling crotch worms? Bus-ted. I’ve been saying for years that you assholes just sit around your house and pull your stories from the internet—thanks for getting careless and proving me fucking right.

Best,

ERIK MURPHY
Cincinnati, OH

Shit! The jig is up!


DEPT. OF GOOSE CHASING
Hey Vice,

I’ve been hearing about this MS-DL for a while, but haven’t been able to find anything about him other than your story. Can you at least tell me what label he’s on so I can check his shit out?

Thanks,

DAVE JORDAN
Chicago, IL

You mean the gay rapper in the Verdad Issue? He’s on Care-A-Lot Records. They are based out of Careville, in Carelvania.


POSTCARDS FROM HELSINKI
Hi,

Attached is the name of a restaurant in Helsinki. It’s Ming Inn, like minging!!! Get it?

I also have this photo of a picture of Sean Connery I saw in a shop window, I don’t know the name of the artist but I just thought it was creepy as fuck!

JAMES PRICE
Via email


CONFISCATED LIVER
Dear Vice,

On the morning of New Year’s Eve, 2005, a flood hit the town next to mine and put downtown San Anselmo under four feet of water, thus ruining all the stores including one of my favorites. It was just a junk store, but they carried Vice. Since the man who owned it didn’t make shit he can’t reopen, leaving me Viceless. Rather than asking for your pity or a subscription or something, I was just hoping you could tell me some places in San Francisco or the lovely county of Marin that carry the magazine, because I am feeling very sad without it. Also, I just wanted to tell you that when I got my liver removed in August I asked if I could keep some for some tight gross jar shit, but they said it was a negative because they cut it into slices like bread and study it for three weeks. Then they incinerate it. I attached a picture of it. It was six and a half pounds when they took it out. And it hella smelled shitty.

Thanks for being cool,

DEMI
Fairfax, CA

PS: San Anselmo deserved to be flooded because they didn’t want to decorate for the holidays so they could save money. It’s one of the nicest towns in Marin.

Re: Your town flooding—big whup. But that liver is something else. You should have smuggled it out of the hospital like the guys in this issue who ate a human placenta. After all, it did belong to you. Could you imagine frying up and eating your own liver? You would have been our hero (for about one day, until someone else did something).


NATIVE DRESS CODE
Yo Vice,

What gives? You come out with a Natives Issue, tell us it’s acceptable to say “Indian” and all, but you don’t have any DOs and DON’Ts. Too scared to poke that kind of fun or what? You can make fun of whitey, darky, and the rest of us, but not the Injuns? Keep it consistent. I need those Dos and Don’ts.

Love,

MARV
Via fax

They all dress the same. The adult men look like middle-American ranchers. The adult women look like ladies who straddle the poverty line anywhere else in the country—sort-of-tight jeans and big shirts with sparkly things on them. And the kids all wear shitty imitations of Fubu and State Property gear. We ran a DOs and DON’Ts online that was culled from the whole world.


RAISING THE BAR
Vice,

This is kind of funny.

MICHELLE
Via email

Classico Domingo. Don’t forget to email your drunk Jenga photos to vice@viceland.com for our “passed out” collection.


BABY SPIKE
Hi Vice,

I was up in North London checking out this mall called Oriental City, a great place for food, and stumbled across this cute syringe, needle included!
This sort of thing would be a hit in Oslo. Norwegian junkies love that kind of weird shit. But anyways, have a go at it.

EIVIND MOLVŒR
Via email

It’s like a My First Works kit by Hasbro. If I’d gotten this as a gift when I was five, I could have gotten the whole junkie-recovery cycle out of the way a lot earlier.


MORE TRUE LIES
Dear Zoo,

Your mag rocks! I get it every week. I work in a big snowboard shop and whenever I’m not talking like a gnarly rad dude, trying to sell planks of overpriced wood to businessmen and lesbians, I sneak off to the girls’ toilets and read your magazine. I say “read”, but mostly I just stare at the eye-poppingly fab pictures of page three girls and readers’ “missuses” and think about touching myself. It’s great. It’s so much better than the other magazines that people bring in. Like, have you seen this magazine Vice? What a load of bollocks! Last issue they did this piece on some guy who’s like an undercover agent for the Muslim extremists. They actually gave him a platform from which to voice his opinions, can you believe it?! I don’t know what their game is but if publications like that are allowed to continue we will end up a nation of understanding, well balanced, tolerant individuals and then what will become of magazines like Zoo? I can’t imagine. In the mean time, I’ll stick by your side and revel in the simple, one-dimensional pleasures your satisfyingly bigoted magazine represents.

Keep up the good work—and more pictures of other blokes’ birds. It almost makes not having a girlfriend myself seem bearable…

Yours,

Matt (AKA Poochie the Rockin’ Dog)
Milton Keynes

Do you see what Matt’s done? Clever, isn’t it? At first we were confused but then we started chuckling with him. His scathing use of sarcasm is kind of undermined a little by the fact that the Vice article to which he draws Zoo’s attention, the one about the undercover Muslim guy, was completely fabricated, like the vast majority of that issue’s content.


CRACK MONEY
Dear Vice People,

I’ve included a check to subscribe because I won $1,200 last night for dropping a bus token (which in Toronto is smaller and lighter than a dime) from my bum into a shot-glass on the floor, so I’m feeling like spending big today. As for the other $1,170, I plan on buying a piano and drugs. Thanks for being the only readable magazine in Toronto. I’m in college studying “creative advertising” and they keep harassing me to buy these awful design magazines featuring shiny chrome teakettles, and telling me if I’m not subscribing to that shit or Marketing Magazine then I will never make it in the business. I figured if I have to subscribe to a magazine, it should be the only one I read. Besides, it’s winter again and much too cold to walk down to Queen St. to pick one up.

Happy holidays, etc.

JASMIN CHENG
Toronto, ON

PS: Here’s an illustration of me in my shining moment of glory. In the final round, the token got stuck to my cheek and I had to bounce up and down in a squatting position while using my hands to pry my cheeks apart to release it.

Congratulations! We would have preferred photos, but congratulations.


A “COOL AND HAPPY” LIFE
Dear Vice,

We have been a great supporter for the Vice mag, but lately, our customers start to complain about the contents of the Vice mag, e.g. All Your Heroes are Dying/Kill Your Parents.

They say the contents are not funny at all and also send out a very bad message to the young generation. There is no respect for the death. Even a criminal dies, we don’t laugh at it and we only feel sorry for any death. We hope there is a better standard regarding respect, morality, social concern.

Your target market is all 18 To 24. They still have a long route ahead of them to make their life cool and happy. Thanks for your notice.

Best regards,

MIMI
Via email

You’re right. Next month look for the Everything Is Swell, Rainbows And Lollipops Issue.


RETRACTION REACTION
Hey Vice,

This is gonna sound pretty stupid but I just want to make sure I’m not publicly ridiculed for a letter you received yesterday. My workmate came out the back of the skate shop where we work yesterday, incensed at the article about Jim Greco and Steve Berra. I was just going on lunch and he asked to jump on my e-mail. He assured me that the article was ridiculous and needed to be responded to. Anyway, I forgot about it till this morning when I looked at the issue, especially the title, “Truth”, and flipped through a few articles. Needless to say, when I pointed out the other satirical pieces to my mate, as well as the cover shot of a dude jumping the Grand Canyon padless and helmetless, he was mortified that his letter might go to print. I am as well, as I’m sure he didn’t change the settings to hide my name! Anyway, I found the article hilarious along with the others.

TOM IVEY
Melb, VIC

It’s amazing how many people this one tripped. Nice one for getting it Tom.


THANKS?
Vice,

I work at a store that gets a drop ship of Vice. I am constantly pestered by characters flinging the door open and rudely demanding the latest issue. The sensationalistic, deliberately-jaded-cutting-edge-flavor of writing and subject matter in Vice in the past few years sucks, so whenever there’s a new issue I hand it over to these miscreants while secretly mocking their mindless appetite for what I have come to view as trashy writing punctuated by a few interesting photos and music reviews.

But. The Natives issue is incredible. First, for the irony of juxtaposing mainstream glossy ads with a people whose proud spirit is unbreakable, despite how little material wealth they have. Second, for the fact all the articles are written in real voices. Third, for the complex understanding the natives have of their attempted annihilation and resulting government dependency. Fourth, for their continued struggle towards self-government.

As you can tell, I ate this issue up. It made me think hard about culture, understanding, objectification, and the outside gaze of people like me on reservation life.

Vice, you rule because of this one issue. I don’t expect this novel to reach any layout pages, but please accept my humble congratulations on an issue very well done.

SYLVIA
Via email

How did this letter end? I stopped reading at “deliberately-jaded-cutting-edge-flavor of writing and subject matter.”


In North America send correspondence to vice@viceland.com (include city and state/province) or mail to Vice Magazine, 97 North 10th Street, Suite 202, Brooklyn, NY 11211. Letters are edited for length.

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