Sign up for 5280's weekly e-newsletters. Want the latest restaurant scoop? The latest happenings around town? Access to exclusive events and deals just for 5280 readers? Westword’s Michael Roberts has the skinny on Bias, a new magazine now being developed under the auspices of the Denver Newspaper Agency, the good folks who own the family-friendly Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News.
Among the first items in a sample issue of Bias magazine that’s been shown to potential [advertising] clients in recent months is “Drink to the Lost,” a feature urging readers to “Find your luck in living with this fun murder map!” An accompanying street guide of downtown Denver spotlights locales where prominent slayings took place, along with toasts to the victims. Guzzlers are encouraged to laud assassinated talk-show host Alan Berg with this remark: “If we’re all to be mowed down for the shit we talk, then the devil’s got a full clip for each of us.” The salute to Li’l Bit, a diminutive, crack-addled prostitute who was offed in 1994, overflows with even more mock profundity: “Let it be said that you were a hooker. Yet we all serve that which we abhor. Let it be said that you were a midget, or a dwarf. Yet we all stand small next to death.”
Awesome, dudes, but not as self-consciously scandalous as a line promising that Bias “will help you carve up your market like Jeff Dahmer at a Rohypnol party.”
Wow. And to think that only last year I was publicly complaining about the DNA’s plans to exploit its government-sanctioned monopoly by getting into the magazine biz.
Guys, I take it all back. If this is really how you think you can shore up your sagging circulation, who am I to stand in your way? Full speed ahead, gentlemen. Pretty please?
Posted 2/15/2005 at 11:29 am by Daniel Brogan
Media :: Permalink :: Comments (8)
On a side note: It’s unfortunate that Erik Elkins appears to have taken a Mickey Mouse Club graduate-like turn in career choices – a la Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. Elkins, instrumental in “hyping” the concept of Bias, was once longtime editor of a weekly kids’ section featured in the Denver Post. Every week Erik provided fun facts, adventure stories and even hung out with youngsters around the globe, seemingly contributing to the greater good and distracting our children from the onslaught of outrageousness that pervades, and often perverts, in the “entertainment for 10 and under” category. But it now appears Elkins has sold his soul to the same glamour of the sex sells mantra that turned the once innocent mousketeers Britney and Christina in to whores of the industry. I haven’t had a chance to read Bias yet, but I certainly can’t wait to see what juicy stories an editor of a weekly kids section must have to contribute to the local and national dialogue of sex, murder and midget prostitutes. Should be fun to see what jokes, puzzles and pictures to color accompany Elkin’s contributions.
brian –
i think you fail to realize the importance of a non-exclusive attitude and understanding of purpose when working in media.
Maybe I’m just being too “Bias”d.
I don’t expect to see writers that contribute to my kids morning reading time to be featured in magazines covering such vitally educational topics as drinking games in mock memory of the murdered. In my opinion, it negates their earlier contributions to media that had weekly impact on young kids lives – it’s about credibility and Mr. Elkins may have lost all of his. As a longtime follower of his contributions to media up to this point I’m not looking forward to what he has to contribute to a magazine that simply sounds like a glossier version of what the Westword already offers to Denver. Just doesn’t fit for me.
I’m really failing to understand why someone with a fan base of 10 and unders, for the last many years, would make a career change to spearhead a project that will certainly alienate those fans. Many parents recognize Elkins contributions over the years to a kids section of a major metropolitan newspaper and I don’t believe I’m the only one that would be surprised and disappointed to see his name as a contributing editor to a magazine that so far does nothing more than reflect the DNA’s desperation to cash in on the smut industry by saluting sensationalism. I haven’t read Bias in its entirety yet, just snippets of what’s to come, so I might be jumping the gun. Maybe it’s full of everything my children have come to expect as followers of Elkins contributions to DNA products. But what I’ve read about it so far leaves me to believe that his decision to hype such a product is likened to if Judy Blume decided to take the Executive Editors position with Hustler.
I do work in media and do appreciate and understand the importance of such an attitude and understanding of purpose. I also believe that if you wish to maintain your integrity in certain areas of that media you should avoid choices with your career that may tamper with that reputation. However, in the end, I do wish Elkins best of luck in his revised career path and hope that he has made the right decision for his legacy of contributions to media. Though I fear he may not have with Bias.
We shall all see what comes of the expectations of a corporate culture to reinvent yourself through the prostitution of your integrity.
(I wonder if the DNA would give me preferred subscriber status?!?)
I resent that you label his career choice as the prostitution of his integrity.
If Elkin were to continue writing content for youth, I seriously doubt that he’d inflict a drastic content make-over to encouraging kids to get start getting trashed and party constantly. Seriously.
I’m sure his integrity for YOUTH CONTENT would remain intact.
Being a media writer means having to be versatile to stay current, desirable, and attuned. The duality of one’s career is what highlights their talent – writers the world over are expected to write opposing niche content without crossing wires.
Rather, I consider it talent, and having a pair of feet firmly placed on the ground.
No where in the rule book does it say that if you’re a writer, you can only write for one industry, and you better stick to it lest your critics compare you to a hooker.
We’ll have to get the first issue together, go have coffee and quip in more detail.
Obviously, the final opinion isn’t set in stone until the first issue comes out. However, for now, I can only make statements of my expectations about what’s to come based on current information about what we should expect to see. We’ll see whether it’s versatility of a talented writer or compromising the integrity of a promising one. My hope is that it’s the former, but based on content that’s reached the public forum so far, it appears to be taking shape of the latter.
Lattes on me if I’m proven wrong, but I stand by my initial observations of the situation as its been presented to the public so far.
As someone who has known Elkins personally, in a professional capacity as a onetime co-worker, I stand by the fact that it’s disappointing to see he’s chosen to play a role in a product that, upon first glance, won’t have content near the rich and positive impact that he has been a part of in the past. But that’s also reflective of the DNAs pending lack of integrity (and even more important than Elkins role – in order that we don’t make Elkins shoulder all the brunt of what’s to come once Bias hits stands) that a company who has produced award-winning journalism and numerous, pretigious awards over the years seems to be on the verge of compromising their reputation, along with their writers, to provide what so far appears to be nothing more than glossy tabloid trash at the local level in order to squeeze advertisers more than what they’ve done since the Joint Operating Agreement took place.
There are more issues to this than Elkins. He’s just the most disappointing one so far. I’m confident far more disappointments will come from Bias than what’s been mentioned to this point. Feel free to discuss further.
I’d love to; unfortunately, I must get back to whoring myself out to the DNA and furthering the decay of western society.
now that’s “Bias”!
Choosing real work over the opportunity to blog all day.
Hope you’re getting a piece of that new magazine action over there too. I hear it’s got people talkin!
Brian, it must be sad to be so narrow minded as to see one role/person. Does this mean we’re all relegated to only one lifetime career? Given that you’ve not read Bias in its entirety, that it hasn’t made its formal debut, perhaps you’re mistaken about Eric Elkins’ integrity. One would guess that a mock up edition may not truly reflect actual content. And if it does, so what? People don’t have to read it. As far as Elkins is concerned, his contributions to the 10-and-under set stand firm. If Jonas Salk or Louis Pasteur had changed direction in their later lives, does that mean their contributions should be ignored?