UK: 'Lads' Mags' Double-Standard

Submitted by Mastodon on Fri, 2013-05-31 18:04

Article here. Excerpt:

'It would be supremely unfair of me to instantly dismiss these groups as whining idiots because in some areas, they do make a good point. As an earnest supporter of healthy body image, I can understand the concerns of some people about skinny bikini-clad women in the media not helping young girls to be comfortable in their own skin. But trying to outright ban lads’ mags is not the answer. Many consider the women in these magazines to be attractive so why is it so bad for them to be able to buy magazines featuring photos of them?
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The thing that irritates and unnerves me the most about this campaign however is that the people behind it and the equality lawyers supporting it are trying to take advantage of genuine equality and sexual harassment laws to further their own agenda. The laws that are in place to actually protect people from being abused and mistreated by real sexists are being misused to try and censor the media based on what a few dozen left wing feminists think. ...
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But the biggest double standard about this is that these activists aren’t getting all huffy about magazines that feature semi-naked men. If it’s legal and socially and morally acceptable to publish a magazine like Men’s Health that frequently features a shirtless man on the cover, then why is it such an abhorrence to have a magazine that has something like Lucy Pinder in a bikini on its cover? It shouldn’t be. To have true equality in this field, it has to be all or nothing. Trying to ban lads’ mags on the basis that they supposedly objectify women while ignoring magazines that do a similar thing with men is only widening the gender divide because it’s suggesting that women should not be shown as objects of attraction in the media while men can be.'

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I have no strong opinion about this stuff, so I don't pay too much attention but if you click on the link and see examples of the mags, they are quite different than what we see in checkout lines in the USA. We have these mags, but they are not commonly found at most retailers, I would never come across these mags in a waiting room or anything like that. I guess it's different in the UK.

The mags with scantily clad women on the covers are clearly marketed for men with strong sexual undertones. Where as muscle and men's health magazines with scantily clad men are marketed for men, not women nor do they have the same sexual undertones. So I don't see the comparisons as being relevant. And here in the USA there has been a slight backlash against Cosmopolitan.

It is my understanding that the proposed ban is about banning magazines being prominently displayed and handled by employees, not banning the right to purchase them.

I don't support any type of legal ban of buying and selling of the mags, but I certainly support anyone's right to put pressure on businesses to voluntarily comply with social attitudes of their customers and employees.

Here in the USA some costumers would likely take their business elsewhere if they saw these mags in a doctors offices, and advocacy groups have been successful in influencing stores to change policy on how they display magazines. Cosmo is often covered up at grocery stores and I know some hair salons and waiting rooms forbid Cosmo in their lobby area.

I am open to the discussion of magazines with images meant to be sexually stimulating and/or with an abundance of articles pertaining to sex to be deemed an "over 18" product or to be sold in a wrapper like Maxim is. I assume these mags as well as Cosmo would fall into that category.

Edit: i've editted this a bunch

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Submitted by Kris on Sat, 2013-06-01 02:50