"To make injustice the only measure of our attention is to praise the Devil."
Normally I don't click on ads. Because then you get a pop-up ad, right? And I try not to pay attention to the ones I'm supposed to watch to read Salon. However, today apparently someone's market research has allowed them to target me accurately, because I not only clicked on the ad, but am now thinking of actually paying for an advertised product.

Of course, before making a rash decision I've decided to blog about it.

The advertised product is Ode magazine, which doesn't seem to have an online version. Their tag line is "The magazine for intelligent optimists." Here is an elaboration on that from their editor:

" I believe it IS news when natural nutrients are shown to cure diseases better than commercial pharmaceuticals do.
I believe it IS news when people in villages and cities in countries that rarely make headlines stand up for their own culture, their own hopes and their own future, by opposing the juggernaut of multinational corporations seeking to take their resources and profit from their misery.
Here are two reasons why our mainstream media don’t agree with me:
Bad news sells - cynical news editors sum it up in the phrase, “If it bleeds, it leads…”
All major media in the US is owned by large, wealthy, multinational corporations, with huge investments in the way things are. "

That seems to make sense. I would read a magazine that brings us some of the good news that's not reported elsewhere. We all already know that hearing bad news all the time makes us fearful and anxious, which makes us more likely to support a totalitarian government, feel insecure and buy things we don't need, try to take a pill for everything as a first resort rather than a last resort--we all already know that, right? So it seems like a good idea to have a source of good news to counteract some of that. In particular I'm reminded of a line from Jack Gilbert:

"To make injustice the only measure of our attention is to praise the Devil."

This is a practical application of that, it seems like. And they even send you a CD of a guided meditation and plant a tree in your name, which makes it almost irresistable to me. $20 for 10 issues. Hmm. Would I have time to read this magazine? Are there other magazines I'd rather subscribe to? So I might not actually buy it, but I think I support the idea.
- posted by k @ 1:48 PM