The Original Fierce Advocate Is Now A Fierce Insert?

UPDATE: Regent is claiming that the Queerty story is false, though the long-winded letter about the future of the magazine does not flatly say "there is no truth to this" so much as it says they're "making strategic and sometimes difficult staff changes," all to strengthen The Advocate's brand. Is Queery just not a fan of Regent in the way it's not a fan of Barack Obama—to the point where any negative story is better than the truth? Or is Regent b.s.ing  and a year from now The Advocate doesn't exist? Read Regent's full reply here.

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I can't think of one snarky thing to say about the death of the leading gay-issues newsmagazine, The Advocate—it has been announced it will now be a 32-page insert inside Out. Which itself will die at some point, probably not years and years from now. It's hard to overstate the loss to the gay community. 

The Advocate has been around for 40 years chronicling gay news, following politics, tracing fads, providing a means by which stars (gay and straight) could directly reach a captive LGBT (not just G and not just L) audience. The death of The Advocate feels like a symptom of the admittedly slow death of "gay" as an identity. More and more, LGBT people are of the mindset that gay shouldn't matter. It shouldn't, but it does—abandoning it prematurely is only going to lead to things that will make us wish for it back again.

  

 When Boy Culture premiered, the party was sponsored by The Advocate. Having its imprimatur on that party made me so proud. I also once did a phoner with Harvey Fierstein for The Advocate. How gay was that sentence? And in a move that thoroughly enraged my slightly older, infinitely less everything else boss, I was chosen as one of "30 under 30" by the magazine—an honor I still can't believe I was lucky enough to receive.

The death of the gay print media (the rest are not long for this world and will also be missed) is a microcosm of the death of all print media (ditto). It's going to be up to bloggers and other on-line reporting/opinion-making to pick up the slack—and frankly, I don't think we're up to the job. For one thing, for many of us, blogging isn't a "job," even if it's hard, time-consuming work. (Queerty is where I found out about The Advocate, and Queerty is no Advocate.) I'm not trying to get a swelled head about it—just the opposite!—but face facts: The surviving print media doesn't give two shits about gay rights and gay issues unless it's that one, nationally appealing case (Matthew Shepard) that comes along every decade.

I will genuinely miss The Advocate—and I think once its absence settles in, many of us will miss what it takes with it.

Comments

[Milkbone]

Freedom of the press belongs to those who own one. The first ammendment doesn't say anything about 'the internets' (nor radio, television, or cable, for that matter). When times get tough for government they'll go for a strict interpretation of our freedoms and say "nope, doesn't say anything about *your* medium...just freedom of the press...where's your press?"

Already the Lewisville, Texas school district has banned online journalists (bloggers) from it's meetings. Very convenient for them; and just as the only medium mentioned in the constitution is waning.

Where's your press, gay people?

[Stephen]

I 7 have a subscription to both through 2012!!!
I am a magazine junky & I have had 3 of my favorites fold or morph in the past year.
Love this blog!

[Insideguy]

There was a time when The Advocate was my only connection to the LGBT world. It saved my life and my sanity. I fear for the kids like me that will no longer have that resource. I know for them that the internet is like my looking up gay words in the unabridged dictionary at my local library.

There is lots of good information and it is easy to make friends. But there is also lots of misinformation. Th Advocate provided not only news but insight into what that news meant.

So much of the publishing world is changing. I have a love of reading that is as visceral as it is mental. There is no pleasure in hunching over a computer or a Kindle that compares to sitting in a comfortable chair with a warm reading light.

[jzipperer]

I always hate to see a magazine go away, but The Advocate has been on life support for some time. That said, I don't think The Advocate had much influence outside the gay community, and only a portion of the gay community at that. Readers of it will (might?) miss it. But I don't know if it'll have much impact on how the rest of the world covers or doesn't cover gay issues. And Queery's report really makes it sound like the laid-off employees will have a better employer practically anywhere else. Very sad.

[MapDark]

Insideguy , KIDS have the Internet.

They can have a connection to the LGBT community for FREE.

I personally couldn't care less for that magazine.

[Matthew Rettenmund]

MapDark: Have you visited the Internet lately? Yes, it's amazing and full of information. But when legit news organizations (like THE ADVOCATE, though they're now claiming they're not really folding) go away, all of their legit info is no longer supplied to the Internet. So what you're left with is opinion and hearsay paranoid delusions and, of course, commerce. THE ADVOCATE was/is? important. A lot of gay-related news that's reported started/starts? with that magazine.

[Desmond]

RIP. Years ago The Advocate became a slick guppie publication, a far cry from the early days when it had an edge and published provocative articles. It has become a vehicle for High-end advertising of products that few GLBT persons are interested in.