And Matt Taibbi’s writing about politics and the economy deserves mention, too. And Hunter S. Thompson wrote about politics and other crazy stuff in RS for years.
Your outrage is egotistical.
His made sense. 
Google “rolling stone covers” and you’ll see that 99% of the images show celebrities and rock stars, most of them portrayed as cool and sexy. Anyone featured on that cover, with that logo and all of the cachet it brings with it, will OF COURSE be compared to rock stars and celebrities. It’s disingenuous to think otherwise.
Rolling Stone can do whatever it wants, obviously, and the story itself is appropriate content, as you and others have pointed out. Yes, the magazine has a long history of more “serious” journalism. But the cover and logo signify very specific things, no matter how much the editors (and some of the posters in this thread) would like to think otherwise. It’s formal analysis 101.
I find it offensive. I’m not personally offended.
I stopped reading that rag when MTV was still playing music.
*Now we both decided to blow up their minds
But their minds won’t really be blown
Like the blow that’ll git ‘em when I get my picture
On the cover of the Rollin’ Stone
Wanna see my picture on the cover
Gonna send one to Chechnya for my mother
Wanna see my jailbird face
on the cover of the Rollin’ Stone*
I subscribed to Rolling Stone for years and there was always plenty of political coverage and news/pop culture coverage of all kinds. If I had a dime for every P.J. O’Rourke story I’ve read …
Anyway, some of my Facebook friends are going crazy but I can’t see the outrage. It’s a news story, and I’d be interested in reading what RS has uncovered about it (if I still read it).
Just to remind people, in 2009 Matt Taibbi wrote an article for Rolling Stone about Goldman Sachs and its role in the financial mess of the past few years. The article memorably begins, “The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it’s everywhere. The world’s most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money. In fact, the history of the recent financial crisis, which doubles as a history of the rapid decline and fall of the suddenly swindled dry American empire, reads like a Who’s Who of Goldman Sachs graduates.”
It’s never been solely about music.
I think part of the story is about “normal kid goes bad.”. The cover photo helps convey that.
Exactly. Any magazine cover is making an editorial statement. Rolling Stones is selling something that Newsweek is not. Which is why they bear different images.
Looking at that cover and only seeing “the guy accused of bombing the Boston marathon” is about as superficial as one can get without being autistic.
For the record, the article is here. I haven’t read it yet, but from the cover blurb it seems like an attempt at understanding what caused a kid like that to turn to such a violent end. It’s a legitimate subject to discuss. I’m absolutely amazed that you’re offended.
If you do a google image search for simply “rolling stone cover” you get barraged with the conclusion that they reserve the cover for the pop culture icon du jour.
Putting this scum in with them seems out of place.
On the other hand, seeing a photo of an infamous bomber on a magazine cover and thinking that means the magazine somehow approves or idealizes the actions of the bomber is asinine.
Yes, we must make sure to only portray bad people as ugly and crazed. Attractive, normal-looking people never do bad things! Tsarnaev was a MONSTER and could never at any point in his life looked like a normal American high schooler! He should have had the decency to grow a crazy beard and wear a turban! Then the pictures he took of himself would be OK to show!
I find it offensive, but that’s partly because of other news I’ve been reading elsewhere which I can’t go into here. It would be too much of a hijack.
Got to say I agree - they aren’t deliberately promoting him or what he did, they don’t care to. They care about what every business and journalist cares about: profit. Selling magazines. I think they’ll succeed, personally, as the amount of people who will buy it because of the extra publicity I imagine will outweigh those who out boycott it in disgust.
CNN calls the cover a ‘slap’ to Boston, but also raises another point which I too was guilty in the OP; calling him a ‘monster’ is premature until he is actually convicted of the atrocity in Boston. Innocent until proven guilty is the basis of our shared legal system, not stirring the mob for cash.
“Glamorous cover shot”? Were you under the impression that they sent Annie Liebovitz out to shoot the cover? And you do realize that The New York Times used the same photo on the front page, above the fold, and no one batted an eye?
I probably would also have gone with a mugshot.
And to be perfectly honest, he is a celebrity/rock star with a certain group of unmentionables. I would be willing that Anders Breivik would love to get the time and attention in the media this jackass will end up getting between everything that happened during and after the bombing, and in the run up to, trial and afterwards. [Norway pretty much ran Breivik through their version of the Judicial System at warp speed, no need for all the hoopla that the US seems to find necessary.]
This is not that far removed from TV celebrity news shows like Entertainment tonight who often lump in the latest serial killer atrocities in with their prattle.
“Tonight we look at Sue Slut’s wardrobe mishap - oh, oh! Is George Clooney cheating on his latest arm candy? - we have the scoop here! Plus, the latest on the victims of the Serial Slasher and how they’re doing! Tonight on Tabloid TV!” Disgusting. Anything to fill up air time. As for Boston bomber’s picture on Rolling Stone - eh, I don’t care if they do a story. “The long strange journey of a misunderstood misfit.” Magazines are desperate to attract readers now. Ever since that appalling Newsweek cover of hot mom breastfeeding a half grown kid, I’m not surprised by anything whatsoever.