2ND publishes second-order journalism. Every piece responds to a specific article, argument, speech, report, or public claim already shaping discourse. If you have a response worth making, we want to read it.
In Response To names the target. It identifies one specific article, speech, report, post, or argument, never a vague reference to recent coverage or general discourse. Stylistically it functions as the publication's editorial initial, the illuminated drop cap of the digital age, opening every piece.
Before criticizing, the writer must demonstrate a fair and close reading of the original piece. This means engaging with its evidence, its reasoning, and the places where its conclusions outrun its argument.
The actual critical engagement. What is missing, wrong, overstated, underexamined, or worth complicating.
A 2ND piece must arrive somewhere. Not necessarily in opposition, but at a clear, defensible conclusion or proposition.
The four elements above are a guide, not a rigid formula. Submissions are assessed on their potential, not their polish. What matters is the quality of the idea, the seriousness of the engagement, and the writer's relationship to the argument. Every submission that moves forward will involve a back and forth between the writer and 2ND editors before anything is adopted for publication. A submission is an opportunity to begin a conversation, not deliver a finished product.
Send a draft or a pitch. Either is welcome. A pitch should be one or two paragraphs covering what you are responding to, why it matters, and what your position is. A draft should follow the four-element structure as a guide.
Use this subject line format:
This is not a title for your piece. It is a citation of the exact source you are responding to.
You are welcome to include a brief note about yourself for publication, or to request anonymity. Writers who publish anonymously are assigned a permanent pseudonym by 2ND, one that remains uniquely theirs across all future work published here. No two pseudonyms are ever the same.