Progressive Wednesday

How to Read Magazines Progressively, Redux

July 31st, 2007 by Progressive Wednesday

Problem:

You can only read Newsweek, Cat Fancy, Martha Stewart Living, and Playboy so much.

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Make Progress:

We could go on and on and on (and on and on and on and…) about magazines, but we’ll just list some of our faves. This isn’t an all-encompassing word-for-typeset-word endorsement of each magazine, each article published, and each author. We just dig reading what they have to say, learning some new things, disagreeing with others. So, without further ado, here goes:

• Utne Reader:

To make good use of a baseball metaphor, this sucker is the clean-up hitter of magazines. The Utne Reader is like Reader’s Digest for progressives in that it reprints articles (many of them quite uplifting in an empowering and honest way) from various print media that most of us have never heard of let alone subscribe to. If we could only subscribe to one progressive print source, we’d pick this one, hands down, feet down, eyes down (you get the idea). What are you waiting for: subscribe already.

• The Nation:

Progressive politics at its best — that’s what you’ll find here. With The Nation, you’ll get multiple points of view on one subject, well-informed letters to the editor that disagree with articles, and pieces that suggest unlikely progressive points of view. A great way to filter your knowledge of contemporary politics. They also publish similarly engaging work on their website. (And did we mention that at under a buck an issue for a subscription, you really can’t go wrong.)

• Paste:

With each issues, you get a CD sampler of indie and a handful of well-known artists. For example, the September 2006 issue (which we happen to have in front of us at the moment) contains tunes by The Detholz! (who Matt saw open for Wilco), Elvis Costello, Beth Orton, and Buckwheat Zydeco (who we have to dig for having neurotransmitters capable of coming up with that name). These CDs tend to have 20 tracks, give or take.

In addition to the sampler, you’ll read editorials, letters to the editor, feature articles on musicians to watch for, under-the-radar movies, cultural commentary, and reviews of albums, books, games, films, and DVDs. Basically, it’s an independent Rolling Stone, only interesting.

• Discover:

Let us preface our endorsement of Discover with this: our belief in science is just that — a kind of faith, albeit a strong one. Science has its limitations, its variations over time, its new discoveries and theories. And the best place we’ve been able to find that is in Discover, an accessible, independent mag about “science, technology, and the future.” Basically, they make superstring theory, synthetic organs, dark matter, and exhaustive studies of cow’s milk understandable and, frankly, interesting as all hell. We give it big, no, big-bang ups (sorry, we had to), and not just because Discover was a nominee for the 18^th Annual Utne Independent Press Awards.

• Wired:

Wired makes us whoop. Its pages are filled with mainly pithy pieces about pop- and not-so-pop-culture technology, oddball science, this thing called the Internet, and topics that fall under the category of “General Geekdom.” As geeks, we admire Wired. We’d admire you that much more if you read it too.

• VegNews:

You don’t have to be a vegetarian or a vegan to appreciate this magazine, which is concerned, not just about our diets (please note that Matt, once a vegan, is now a born-again omnivore, though likely not for long), but the environment, politics, activism, exercise, and overall healthy living. If you are a vegetarian or vegan, this is magazine seems all-but mandatory reading; you’ll feel more educated, find excellent recipes, and probably feel more a part of the vegetarian community.

• Consumer Reports:

Okay, come closer, here’s a confession: we buy things, and some times we accidentally buy absolute crap. And we want to make sure we get stuff that’s not going to break right away and won’t send us cursing back to the store where we bought it demanding a refund, or worse and more useless, running over it in our driveway. Consumer Reports accepts no advertising, so they’re beholden to no one. Sure, we think they have bad taste in beer (they once ranked Milwaukee’s Best the best domestic brew), but, because we like to think of ourselves as relatively mature, we can get past that. They helped Matt buy a great car, and Eric a TV that he all-but kowtows to during hockey games broadcast in HD. CR also has an online subscription, so you can access their info wherever you are.

• Sojourners:

For the purposes of full-discloser, we’re going to reveal that both Eric and Matt consider themselves Christians, and, at times, their faiths have ebbed and flowed from first fervor to agnosticism and back again. At the same time, we respect, admire, and draw wisdom and strength from many other faiths.

But because of our personal religious interests, we’re life-size fans of Sojourners, edited by Jim Wallis, whom you may have caught on Meet the Press. Sojo’s mission goes a little something like this: “to articulate the biblical call to social justice, inspiring hope and building a movement to transform individuals, communities, the church, and the world.” Whew — that’s a pretty lofty goal, eh? Well, why aim low? The thing is, this sucker practices what it preaches, and includes a gaggle of engaging cultural, spiritual and political commentary, feature articles, pithy news briefs, humor, reviews, poetry and conversations. It’s a rather complete magazine for progressive Christians.

Other solid (and by solid we mean “sah-lid,” circa 1957) choices — for their interesting and engaging content and not necessarily for their politics — include:

• American Prospect
• Business 2.0
  
• The Economist
• Fast Company
  
• The Forward
• Harpers
• Liberty
• Mother Jones
• Ms.
• Nerve
• The Sun
• Z Magazine

Photo by this literate dude.