“Curse of Youth,” an interesting take on those
newspaper tabs for tots, provides a shorthand clue to success:
“If you want your newspaper to appeal to young people, you must be willing to print the word
‘fuck.'” Vulgar but true, and here’s the reason:
Young people want the world as they see it: without filters. It’s why they love
“The Daily Show.” Because it’s smart, informed,
crude and passionate. Like young people. Young people will argue vehemently with you for hours
about party politics, about religion, about love and war and peace and that weird new $20 bill.
They will curse when they argue, using words like “fuck.” Then, once they are done, they will go
out to a bar and get fucking blasted-ass drunk and go home with another young person and fuck
like bunnies until they pass out. That’s their world, and if you wanna live in it, you’d better print
it.
The trouble is, by that reasoning The New
Yorker should be more popular with young readers than Us Weekly or People — and it ain’t. Is it possible that young
people are not as passionate and smart as claimed? That they’re just vulgar? Terrible but true.
