This readers’ letters are taken from the fall 2025 issue of VICE magazine, THE BE QUIET AND DRIVE ISSUE, a Deftones special. We’ve sold out our copies, the only ones left are in stores—perhaps there’s one near you? Secure yourself the next 4 issues by subscribing.
LATERAL THINKING
To whomever, where ever,
“Community Reinforcement Approach” is allegedly how to break free from my Meth Use. Great, I can ‘break free from meth grip it has on my life,’ said sarcastically. It involves coping skills: training and social, recreational, vocational ‘Reinforcement,’ Focuses on replacing substances with ‘positive, healthy behaviors’
What if my meth use is what my positive healthy behavior is, cause I cant get a dr to prescribe me the ADHD meds I desperately need to be able to function daily? Helps me be able to be in social situations and show up to work, eat, and more. They always bark at me saying one day it wont be like this, it will all come crashing down eventually. Really in the last 5 years I been able to maintain this through Harm Reduction practices has keep me at a level thats maintainable.
‘You just need some’ FUCKING ‘rainbows, flowers, and happy thoughts and you will see the light’—No i fucking wont the light has burnt out a long time ago I just havnt gotten around to change the lightbulb plus SPIDERS have made it home. I guess what am trying to get at is the world is fucked cant we accept that? Here in BC were going 10 years into a public health emergency of toxic drug poisonings. We are losing loved ones daily so thinking fucking rainbows and happy thoughts will be the fucking answer…
For shit’s sake, wake up and smell the death we been surrounded by for the last 10 years. The government has given up on us. We are saving ourselves. So i may use meth daily but at least in a way it helps me cope and function. Thats what makes me pretty fucking cheerful cause it dosnt tell me to ‘Stay Positive’—if it ever does then I will know am fucked and lost it…..
Always and tommorow,
Kay
Via email
While ‘What if the crystal meth is actually holding my life together?’ feels like exactly the kind of galaxy-brain take that would come from huffing too much crystal meth, your letter’s more cogent than 99 percent of what we receive in this accursèd inbox, so kudos for that. If you ever start believing that you’re being followed around by helicopters, it might be time to knock the crank on the head. Hope things get better up in BC.
TALKING LOVE WITH DR. FUNK
Dear VICE,
Some thoughts about love from a 33-year-old:
- Opposites attract, but sameness lasts.
- Find someone who share the same values as you.
- Love is a muscle. You have to workout everyday to keep it strong. Communication is key in any relationship.
- Life is short, but love makes it long.
Thank you for reading.
Jaye Funk
Sent from my iPhone
Thanks for the insight, Jaye. Please write to us again in ten years’ time to see if ‘some thoughts about love from a 43-year-old’ are any different. We’ll put them on the cover and devote the entire magazine to breaking them down in forensic detail.
COUNTRY LUMPKINS
Hello,
My name is Adam Lumpkins I am reaching out as a member of Gretna Fire Dept in Gretna Va.
We are having a golf tournament Sept 13th 2025 to help raise money for our operation cost. We are looking for any type of donations to raffle off at the tournament to go towards operations. I know it is a long shot reaching out but we are growing as a department and trying to keep up equipment and trucks has been hard too do with grants not being accepted. Please feel feel to reach out if you have any questions or need any further information.
Thanks in advance,
Adam Lumpkins
Via email
Hi Adam. Sorry we couldn’t get you anything in time for the big day. If it’s any consolation, I just had a look around your hometown on a YouTube video with 751 views and it didn’t look like there was anything there worth burning down. We hope you guys manage to stay out of trouble until those misers at city hall loosen the pursestrings.
UNRAW-FUCK YOUR MIND
To VICE,
In praise of telephone poles-
Don’t we all prefer telephone poles, decorated with tattered paper and old tape? Isn’t the rust of ancient staples better than this, an overrated LED gizmo that wants to raw-fuck our minds? The telephone pole, that innocent tree, does not make king’s gold off you looking at them (ignore the wires, pls). Telephone poles; they do not target you, consume you, or tell you they are more than what they are. Here’s to the telephone pole! That trusty and faithful friend to the artist, the activist, and the lay-about. Here’s to taking back bulletin boards, dumpster bins, and urinal walls. May I see you there!
This account will self-destruct in 24 hours. DM for my email if you don’t have it already.
Calvin Bright
Email Withheld
This is all very nice. But you think telephone poles are harmless? I’ve got two words for you: ‘Targeted’ and ‘individuals.’ When the helicopters start following you home from work you’ll be eating your words, Calvin ‘Not So’ Bright!
A MISSIVE FROM THE ABYSS
Dear VICE,
What’s your top 10 celebrity meltdowns?
What is a meltdown?
Why haven’t I received a single Vice magazine yet?
Are you interested in featuring artists living in a dying nyc scene that’s getting swallowed by trust funds, the rich and those who are looking to pay their way into nyc ‘cool’?
Has the heart of nyc stopped beating or is there still a pulse? Have we addressed the mass of new apts threatening the last of true nyc underground music venues and art spaces that are being pushed out by the most greedy landlords?
Can you live in bushwick? How many dildos you own will truly tell.
Ew, this isn’t about kink shaming you asshole.
Thank you,
For taking the time to let your brain rot a little.
Travis
PS: Where’s my f#$kin’ mag, guy.
Via email
The issues you don’t have, we will sort. The issues you do have may be less resolvable.
AN A-GRADE SUCKUP
Dear VICE,
The Reasons to Be Cheerful Issue [v29n2] reads like a jar of fresh water in the desert of desperation. I drank every word to quench my thirst for hope and joy.
It feels like we live in the era of “Joy is Punk” (or something like that), alongside “Print is Punk”. I’m here for it. However, I was pleasantly surprised to have my perspective shift by the piece Touch Glass. As someone who prides herself in having uninstalled Facebook and Instagram from her smartphone (and having no TikTok account), I found that Katherine Dee made a compelling argument for honouring cyberspace. As for everything though, moderation is key; I still believe in a balanced diet of touching grass and glass.
So, I guess Cyberspace can also be Punk… if you stick it to the algorithm!
Christine Beaudoin
Via Carrier Pigeon
The torrent of positivity that has followed in the wake of our contrarian-blast-of-optimism summer issue has left us feeling sick as pigs. Thank you for writing to us, Christine. We agree that a balanced diet is key. Which is why we’re going all out to horrify as many people as possible with our next issue. Hope you hate it! I miss the even keel.
A FAN WRITES
Dear Kevin,
Thank you for fucking my girlfriend. I think she really enjoyed it.
I’m getting in touch to talk to you about a project I’m currently working on that I think would be a great fit for Vice. Over the past almost decade now, I have been writing a series of novels inspired by the most influential discography in alt metal history. I see private music as a milestone for me personally, marking a very special time in my life, so I think now is a perfect time to draw the Deftones project to a close.
The pitch: a cycle of ten novels based on the Deftones’ catalogue, one book per album, with each of the novels drawing themes and imagery from its counterpart in chronological order, possibly with accompanying features and profile running in the magazine? As you will see from the brief synopses below, the content of each novel reverberates with the content and atmosphere of each respective record.
In the first novel (Bowl, based on Adrenaline), we are introduced to the cycle’s main protagonists, a group of young Deftones acolytes who are surprised when the lead single of the band’s forthcoming album seems to take them as its subject. Is this the ultimate gratification? Or an irreversible confusion of fandom and reality? The emphasis shifts from novel to novel, with some volumes boasting innovative structural devices and narrative conceits. For example, Guiders, the second novel (based on Around the Fur), wherein our young protagonists decide to form their own band. The interpersonal drama takes place entirely during the 27 minutes and 44 seconds’ silence between the last track “MX” and the hidden track “Damone”. In the third novel Angel/Street Team, based on White Pony, the main riff drops out, so to speak, and a filter turns everything to metallic clatter and ice. Set in a morgue.
In the fourth novel Abscissa (based on Deftones) unexpected success also leads to paranoid fantasies. The glinting edges of a diagrammatic conspiracy is uncovered. In the fifth novel Sheen (Saturday Night Wrist) mind-reeling jealousies and ecstatic trysts create a sense of delirium, upending the character’s lives and formal prose conventions (the opening line of my letter is actually from this novel, Kevin). Graphic.
Across Pranks (Diamond Eyes), Paper Melt (Koi No Yokan) and Gore Portal (Gore) — which I see almost as a self-standing trilogy within the wider cycle — pulpy narratives start to fold back in on themselves, coming to a twisted conclusion in Gore Portal, a kind of erotic Deftones fan fiction about an aspirant writer’s erotic Deftones fan fiction. The penultimate work: Infinite Edit, based on Ohms. A slick but haunted tale told from the perspective of a decommissioned microphone (the microphone was used to record post-mortem exam reports, but has since developed a voice of its own).
The final novel, as yet untitled, will be based on/inspired by private music. The snake featured on the album art is very fitting, with elements of the last novel in the sequence echoing the first and generally dealing with themes of rebirth and repetition. The tenth takes the form of an unsolicited proposal to a magazine editor/book publisher from an unknown writer, pitching a ten-book cycle of novels, each based on a Deftones album (including itself).
Let me know when would be a good time to get started on discussing a release schedule, design, marketing etc and when you would need to look at the completed and in-progress manuscripts. I’m sure budgets are tight, but it would be good also to discuss rates given the ambition and scope of the project.
Yours,
Steans
Via Wattpad
Steans—only a total moron would ever commission a pitch like this. Count me out.
This readers’ letters are taken from the fall 2025 issue of VICE magazine, THE BE QUIET AND DRIVE ISSUE, a Deftones special. We’ve sold out our copies, the only ones left are in stores—perhaps there’s one near you? Secure yourself the next 4 issues by subscribing.
The post VICE Mail: Reader Letters from the Fall Issue of VICE Magazine appeared first on VICE.
