Customer Review(s)
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Stinkin' Thinkin'
Comment: Somehow I'm on the mailing list for this magazine --believe me I wouldn't pay for it -- and since it is just about the only pipeline I have to the gay club culture at this point, it leapt to mind when viewing a film just a moment ago. Not at all the sort of film one might be thinking of, if you were crude, on seeing this magazine. Rather I just watched the Youtube video of the Vernissage of Art Basel Miami Beach 2007. This magazine came to mind, because it makes me think of my memories of gay clubs, how tedious they are, how tiresome the crowd. And watching the Vernissage I thought of something I didn't think of when were down there a year ago. The whole scene is just like a gay bar. No one seems to be having a good time, no body is looking at anybody else, and hardly anyone is looking at the art. It used to be that gay people were hyper-culturalists -- the most cultured
guy into the arts. Thus gay culture was also a de-facto Avante-Garde. What gay guys were into would become mainstream later. I'm not just talkin' gentrifying neighborhoods and hairstyles; but artistic movements or philosphical tendencies. It may have had to be a "sub-culture" because of repression, but it still made a contribution worth making. I wondered whether I would regret not going down for Art Basel this year. Except for the socializing I can't say I do.
But looking at the Vernissage and realizing that something very important is in fact happening there: money is changing hands, some important new art art will come to the fore inevitably. But it happens in a scene of vacant stares and nervous laughs, which seems to be the attenuated cultural contribution of the gay club scene. Because there was a very peculiar way that gay men interacted in such settings, and I'm not talking about sex at all. I used to think such way of interaction was peculiar to the gay club scene. But now it seems to have spread in an incredible bit of cross-pollination to the art-scene. This very stupid magazine celebrates
this very phenomenon with silly articles about nothing at all. Gay culture
used to mean aspiring to intelligent rapier wit. Now it means giving off attitude in just the right way. That the art scene has taken a cue from this so-called culture is the unavoidable conclusion. Too bad for all of us gay or straight. For history shows that the art world is on the forefront of larger tendencies of culture. That should strike some instinctive chords of caution in any sensitive soul.
Customer Rating: Summary: 3 1/2 maybe
Comment: I was referred to Instinct by good friend, which described it as a bit better than the typical gayzine. And, for its first years, the magazine presented sarcastic and biting satire of everything gay--the kind of biting wit you might find on HereTV vs. LOGO (and an insulin IV drip and without the saccharin aftertaste).
It held promise of being the FHM or
Maxim for gays. Classic bubbles on photos included the irreverent broken-hearted whine, "I can still smell him on my finger".
In the last few years, it has reformatted into the typical OUT, Genre, Esq. or
GQ. I won't say it isn't "good" but less bite, more "woof" in the pages--from suave celeb models and interviews to its swimsuit edition and men's fashion pages.
