Rolling Stone - Dzhokhar Tsarnaev

I'm just curious what everybody's take is on the controversy surrounding the Boston Bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev being put on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine.

It's a LOT easier to just shout and scream about how terrible Rolling Stone is than to actually read the long 5-page article and come to the horrible realisation that we just don't know what's going on in our friends heads. It's really comforting to imagine that the kinds of nutters who could murder innocent people must be really bloody obvious, but the horrible truth that's brought home by the very balanced Rolling Stone piece is that that's just a fantasy.

I urge anyone who's thinking of condemning Rolling Stone to read the article first, all of it, and then have a think about how they feel about it:

http://refhide.com/?http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/jahars-world-20130717

I think the editors note at the start of the article explains the motivation behind, and the importance of, the article very well:

Our hearts go out to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing, and our thoughts are always with them and their families. The cover story we are publishing this week falls within the traditions of journalism and Rolling Stone’s long-standing commitment to serious and thoughtful coverage of the most important political and cultural issues of our day. The fact that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is young, and in the same age group as many of our readers, makes it all the more important for us to examine the complexities of this issue and gain a more complete understanding of how a tragedy like this happens.

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It's easier to lash out than to actually confront difficult issues - which is all I have to say about the ranters.

B.

bigsal said:

Is just an insult to the families of the families of those killed. An ode to violence.

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I read it.

All if it.

Did you?

I can't fathom how anyone who read it could come to that conclusion unless they didn't comprehend the English language.

An honest look into the mind of a killer is uncomfortable, but nothing in that article in any way glorified violence of any kind.

B.

bigsal said:

Anyone who knows me knows that I do not speak English, but I will try to highlight the same my, and I repeat my, point of view.

What I context to the directors of the newspaper, not is the content of the article, but the cover di the front page.

The article is unexceptionable, but you could avoid decicare the cover to that person, usually dedicated to characters from the world of music and not only that they are presented as positive to the readers.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I put myself in the shoes of the parents of Martin, and even though someone may not like it, I side with them.

I want to add that I know this magazine for many years, one of the absolute best in the music world, but on this occasion, I disagree with the choice of newspaper to publish this hero in negative on the cover.

From a commercial perspective, the choice was As Well, because the whole world speaks of this fact.

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I guess it comes down to this for me:

1) what is the purpose of a cover?

Simple - to tell you what is inside. Covers often show bad people, that doesn't mean those bad people are being glorified, it means that there is an important story about that person inside. The story may be good, or it may be bad.

2) what is the purpose of photography in a magazine?

Simple - to enhance the themes of the stories. To make them more real. What is the story here? The story is that a very ordinary, kind, and even cute kid was turned into a "monster" (to use the word from the cover). We like to think loonies are obvious, noticeable, that you'd recognise one on the street, the article strips people of that fantasy, and the photo helps it to do that.

3) What is the purpose of a good magazine article?

To inform, to make you think, and to inspire discussion.

Win, win, win, and again, the photo on the cover really helps with this. Not because of the dumb right-wing reactionaries, but because it is supposed to make us uncomfortable. He's cute, but he's a murder.

The bottom line is that the photo is real, it shows one aspect of who this kid really was. The photo is not gratuitous, it's not there just to be offensive, it's there to help tell a story that I think needs to be told.

I have gained respect for Rolling Stone because of this, not lost it. I have not lost any respect for the Fox News nuts, because you can't lose what you never had

B.

The article was very good journalism. Understanding who this person was, and how he became something else is important. I do not agree with those who think there should have been no story

The cover is different. I think it's primary intent was to enflame; gin things up and cause a stir. How many saw the cover? Many more than read the story. Yes, the photo is real. Putting it on the cover was poor judgment.

The cover of Rolling Stone has a singular place in American pop culture. It's the signal that you have arrived as a pop star. There's even a song about it. This young man is not the latest bad boy pop star. He's a monster.
Rolling Stone did this once before. They put the monster Charles Manson on the cover.
The reaction was similar.

tonka said:

The article was very good journalism. Understanding who this person was, and how he became something else is important. I do not agree with those who think there should have been no story

The cover is different. I think it's primary intent was to enflame; gin things up and cause a stir. How many saw the cover? Many more than read the story. Yes, the photo is real. Putting it on the cover was poor judgment.

The cover of Rolling Stone has a singular place in American pop culture. It's the signal that you have arrived as a pop star. There's even a song about it. This young man is not the latest bad boy pop star. He's a monster.
Rolling Stone did this once before. They put the monster Charles Manson on the cover.
The reaction was similar.

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They were right to do it for Manson, and they right to do it now. This is no ordinary edition of Rolling Stone, this is a very special edition, and the cover needs to reflect that.

Is is that you think there should have been no image on the cover to match the biggest story of the year? Or just that you wanted a pic that makes him look evil instead of how he really looked?

B.

Bigsal - Rolling Stone is not just a music magazine though - they do investigative news pieces too. When General McCrystal was exposed a few years ago it was in Rolling Stone Magazine (http://refhide.com/?http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-runaway-general-20100622).

I'm still wondering your issue with the cover is that it included the bomber at all? Or if it's with the particular shot of him they chose to use?

B.

Journalists live on a fragile balance. Saying things that are not done are easily condemning them. I am not a journalist, but in the end of the seventies of the last century I made cartoons for a journal. I made a cartoon about the West Bank (Israel). It was a simple cartoon. A Israeli soldier was standing with his son before the wall. On the wall was written Ghetto. The boy asked his father: Is that bad, a Ghetto? The father answered: It depends my son, on which side of the fence you are. I made it to the international bible of Antisemitism. My cartoon next to a cartoon of the New York Times. As I said, journalists live on a fragile balance.

bigsal said:

This annoyed me, I admit, and I expressed those who were my feelings about it.

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You were not alone in feeling like that.

I think it's understandable that people had a strong negative emotional response to the cover. It definitely makes me uncomfortable. But, I don't think that's a bad thing.

I think the intention of the cover was to make people uncomfortable. The whole story is unsettling. We don't like to think that a regular kid can transform into a mass-murderer, but the fact is they can, and the cover forced us all to face that fact.

I always like to end discussions on a happy note, but I can't seem to find a silver lining here - so much hurt, so much tragedy

B.

gb2000ie said:

I guess it comes down to this for me:

1) what is the purpose of a cover?

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From the publisher's point of view, the cover's purpose is to sell the magazine. People look at the cover at the news agent and decide if they want to pick it up and buy it.

Of course, it's best if the cover reflects the most important story in the magazine - though publishers bypass journalism all the time and slap a popular celebrity on the front when there is much better stuff inside. (People magazine sure misses Princess Diana - their sales went though the roof every time she appeared on the cover.)

If I put myself in the publisher's shoes, and I had Janet Retiman's profile of Jahar Tsarnaev in the magazine, there is no question that I would want to illustrate that article on the cover. So what else would the cover be but a photo of Mr. Tasarnaev?

Yes, they could have run the article and then put the boy band One Direction on the cover. But that would have looked ridiculous when clearly the most talked about piece would be Retiman's.

Also, I think the cover bears out the theme of the article that Jahar is not a "monster". If we can label him a monster, then we can put distance between him and ourselves. But the point is, there is no distance. This terrorist is a human person, as are we. He could be our friend, or cousin, or co-worker.

This is similar to a discussion I was having with my sister-in-law over the NRA's slogan that "the best way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun".

That statement presumes that there are two groups of people, bad and good. But that is false. Every human is capable of jealousy, fear, and prejudice - just as they are also capable of love, generosity, and compassion. Those are qualities all of us experience.

We go to the movies and are entertained by a world where all the bad stuff comes from aliens and super-villains that have lost their humanity. In the real world the bad stuff comes from other people who are feeling the same things we are feeling.

I think that just may be scarier than aliens from outer space.

Why not a follow-up cover with photo's of the victims of this horrendous act? That's the true story at this point.

Didn't even realize RS was still in print until I saw this on TV