Discussing the virtues of men’s and women’s magazines
By Rachel Giese and Katrina Onstad
October 31, 2006
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/media/magazinediscussion.html
Dear Rachel and Katrina,
First off, I wanna start by saying that I love reading your gals' reviews on cbc.ca. I particularly remember a review Katrina wrote on Hotel Rwanda that I found very thoughtful. Thanks!
I find your email exchange on men's mags extremely timely. I recently picked up a copy of Men's Vogue. Apparently, it's a new mag that started a few months ago, and I Love It. Unfortunately, I am unfamiliar with Esquire and GQ, and didn't want to do the research before responding to your email exchange.
I ask, who is the target audience of Men's Vogue? And honestly, I can't say they target men. I was at the supermarket, and I even asked the shaggy-haired butcher with the braces, "Would you read this?" With Jude Law gracing the cover, we flipped through a few pages. He seemed to have been interested in the article about gifts for women, but the gifts turned out a *little* over budget. I continued to ask, "What about this article on *how* to be a man?" He responded that it's quite straightforward being a man, and that he really didn't need any help from a mag. I said, "good for you," but didn't mean it.
I work out at the Y, I'm on the treadmill, and I take off my glasses that are slip slop sliding down my nose. I try not to hover my face two inches over the pages. So, I can't read the small print of the articles. But do you know what drives me to finish the last three minutes, without taking yet another break? David Beckham's got milk. I’ve flipped through the entire women's mag, and that is the page I land on, that is the page I stay on. And let me tell you, Men's Vogue (to which the Y has yet to subscribe), provides the visual for how men become beautiful: what products men buy and use, and how men pout, strut, or glare under the scrutinizing lens of a photographer.
Myself, obviously, I ain't Scarlett, Sienna, or Jessica (either one). But that doesn't mean I don't want men to look like David. Ah, David, he is someone we (heterosexual women) could run for, ellipse for, cycle for, bend, flex, and squat for.... So if the role of women's mags is to make a woman feel crappy about herself, then I think the role of men's mags (Men's Vogue, in this case) is to make a woman make a man feel crappy about himself. This is gender equality at its best, non?
Sincerely,
kh cheung
ps- Am I understanding correctly? That Esquire sectioned up a picture of a woman's body, revealing piece by piece per issue? ICK! That is incredibly unbelievable and offensive. They should issue an apology for that.
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3 comments:
oooh... it *mite* have been Hugh Jackman on the cover... don't rmbr well.... hmm... -kh
Have you ever wondered why women hate women so much? I could only explain the condition of modern women mags by saying it must be because women hate women. Or women hate being women. Or women want to perpetuate the idea of women hating women. I no longer know where this is going. In the 60s, you have women mags telling women they need to cook a great dish and keep a neat home. In the 21st century, you have women mags telling women to get a facial, tweeze their brows, shave their legs, lose weight, in addition to cooking a great dish and keeping a neat home. I seriously wonder if they're trying to tell people who cannot do any of the above (like me) to just kill themselves right now and stop wasting precious oxygen.
heheh... i can't do any of the above either. a lot of feminist theorists have conjectured as to why women hate women. and, without getting too much into detail, some say it's part of living in a patriarchal culture governed by categories in opposition, where "women" is "bad," since "men" is "good."
And in terms of what women are being taught, I worry about women in the future, b/c i think we are taught to perform *too* many roles. We're all career women with excellent educational backgrounds, but we haven't shaken the responsibility towards keeping house, rearing children, and being "beautiful." That's a lot on a woman's plate.
kh
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