More cash.

Your magazine--above all of the others--has been the saving grace for many kids out here in Meriden, Connecticut. Meriden, like many towns around the United States, is a post-industrial wasteland, the remnants of metal production for World War II. Now, in that industry's smoldering ashes, saplings have grown--mainly as Wal-Marts, gas stations, and fast food restaurants. These surroundings can be quite suffocating and nauseating. When the city promises us a skatepark and provides us with a prefab playground, caged in and on display like an exhibit in a museum for the rest of the town to gawk at, our only defense is to run to the fortress that is Thrasher. After watching Skate and Destroy or Time Bomb, we then have the proper empowerment and confidence to go back out into the streets, the facade of real life shut out by the beautiful simplicity of the act of rolling on a Skateboard. The focus on skating, and only skating, together with sharp, intense pictures and witty articles and columns, makes Thrasher a monolith of free press and raw action, standing against a sea of complex ugliness that is reality. That said, I was appalled to be skimming through the pages of the August issue and stumble upon a Wal-Mart ad depicting an unnamed man riding on a drawn line connecting the Dickies and Wal-Mart logos. The caption says, "Break rules/Tame the boards." This must be one of the most pathetic, transparent ad campaigns I've ever come across. Break rules? Wal-Mart? Never. When I think Wal-Mart I think that giant, overbearing smiley face welcoming in middle-aged, morbidly obese people to marinate under fluorescent lights while filling their carts with cheap shit that they don't need. I know I sound preachy, like the cliche hippie protesting the juggernaut corporation, but Wal-Mart has brainwashed the public into caring more about the cost of goods than the value of life. I had always believed that skateboarding especially Thrasher, had a higher perspective of the way things are and would not become enveloped in the same pocket as the rest of America. I can at least speak for my group of friends when I say we are force-fed enough industry outside of skateboarding to last us a lifetime. When it starts to seep into our only means of escape, it becomes difficult to have any degree of hope for the future. This incident is similar to the development of wilderness and national parks.

It all embodies the destruction of innocence and the destruction of beauty by the economy, just simply became it cannot be bought or sold. I am only 18, which means Thrasher has been around longer than I have and I'm sure has much more wisdom and experience, if not made void by years of alcohol use and concussions. Maybe this ad is a joke or part of some plan that I cannot fathom. I will not let my guard down, however, for fear that this ad is not a joke but the start of a degenerative virus in Thrasher mag. If a virus like this is left unattended, the result could be fatal--you could be the next Transworld Skateboarding and then the next Transworld Snowboarding, and then a casualty on the Consumer Report. The wit of your writers and the eye of your photographers will not be able to save you. The point is, Wal-Mart has no place in skateboarding, and although you can and should print whatever you want in your mag, it is unnatural to keep the ship afloat with support of an enemy ship. And us kids would rather see the ship sink with honor, confident that it will resurface with more glory than ever.

Ben James

Meriden, CT

I live in a concussion.--T-ed