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Vice Blog

NEW YORK - WHAT HAPPENED TO COLORS?

used to be a great magazine that people accused Vice of stealing from (we both did an issue about food). We did steal an editor from them, but I don't think we'll be taking any liberties with their content anytime in the near future. Their latest issue is comprised of 30 prayers from Tibetan monks dedicated to the victims of the Sichuan earthquake this year with little holes at the top of the page so you can make them into a prayer flag. This would be a grand little gesture if the prayers didn't a) look like they were designed by a 15-year-old Incubus fan for his high school art fair and b), contain some of the most backhanded compassion this side of 9/11.

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Here's a nice little note from Ngawang Tsering:
"What I see is very similar to what happened to us. It reminds me of all the Tibetan families who lived in poverty and needed help. So please, all of us around the world should help."

Lobsang Thupten chimes in:
"Pollution is changing the order of the five elements. The environment is at risk more and more with each day, and this is not  concern for the Chinese alone. This is a concern for all human beings."

Can you imagine how cheesed off people would be if next time there was a big tornado in Nebraska, some Chinese magazine solicited a bunch of native americans to blame the whole thing on pollution?

As is often the case, the biggest kicker is in the fine print. To save you the trouble of clicking, here's what it says at the bottom of the intro.

"Please note: sacred words and symbols are printed on these pages. Be respectful. Don't throw the magazine away. Don't trash it. Don't forget it in a drawer. If you really can't stand it anymore, go and burn it in the garden… the smoke will deliver the blessings to the sky."

How's that for a scheme? I think we're going to slip an ankh into the next couple issues of Vice so that no one can get rid of it unless they put the letters section in a canopic jar and mummify the rest. Also, we like that it's perfectly fine and dandy to cram these sacred pages on a shelf between US Weekly and Hustler and hawk them for eight bucks a pop, but drawers are somehow out. How does that work? Does Borders have to take all the issues no one ends up buying out into the parking lot and torch them to avoid being dickheads? What if someone's opening a box of magazines and the exacto cuts through the first few pages of the top issue--now he's got to work off a bunch of extra karma or spend 1/6 billion years being speared in niraya? Real nice, Colors.

Oh, by the way, they're also selling t-shirts.