A Magazine For Thinking Men

I never thought there would be a time when I would get tired of looking at semi-naked, seductively posed women in magazines. Earlier, when FHM first came out, I bought the magazine just for the fun of being able to legally, with no shame, go up to the counter and buy a magazine with a semi-naked celebrity on the cover. No more skulking about dark malls, moving to the back of some obscure magazine store, where, ahem, "male" magazines were at the back shelf, behind old copies of Good Housekeeping and Home and Garden.

We had arrived, I thought, at a new phase in periodicals, where men could get everything they wanted, including some titillation, in one magazine! It took me a few more issues to realize that, well, no, we didn't get everything we wanted.

The pictures were all well and good, but, moving beyond that, I found the articles forgettable and, at times, just outright wastes of reading time. Eventually, I stopped.

However, finally, there is a magazine that is worth reading. Rogue magazine was a surprise when I finally picked an issue up. My first thoughts were, well, here's another magazine with pretty women on it, though the pictures seem to be more artful than those other ones. I was pleasantly surprised that I actually paid more attention to the articles than the pictures. The articles were intelligent, the (non-female anatomy) pictures beautiful. It was a good, no, a great read.

Their current issue has two available covers. I like the one on top more.

There are quibbles. I sometimes feel like a gatecrasher in some posh party, especially in the fashion and society sections, where society's elite do, well, what they do. The items on their fashion sections are all cool, beautiful, and...beyond my reach, at least for now. But then, what's life without a little aspiration, right?

Interestingly enough, it seems like you have to be firmly entrenched in society to be called a rogue. I love irony.

The images are from the Facebook site of Rogue magazine.