In my favourtite cafe a few weeks ago I was happily waiting for my Latte when the waitress , seeing me with nothing to do- promptly landed a womens glossy magazine on my table.
Now I rarely come into contact with this breed of publication but curiosity-( and not wanting to seem ungrateful ) prompted me to have a wee peek.

I'm not kidding- within 5 minutes I was feeling fat, ugly and thoroughly dissatisfied with my lot in life! ( slight exageration here but you know what I mean!)

Now I know that you lot out there will say that 'if there's no cracks the water can't get through' - but think of the drip...drip...drip effect....
Even the most impervious of us would crack under this kind of asault.

In the same cafe a couple of days ago I was reading the paper ( thank God )
& it said that a high percentage of women (can't remember exact %) felt depressed , worthless and a waste of space after reading their regular womans magazine.
Sounds like an addiction to me!?

Jayne

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Most of the women (sic) in those mags are under 20 if not 18, so don't worry, you look fine.
The other saying: If you purify the pond, the lillies die. hmmmm

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first they show you, airbrushed beauties, then write about the crisis of the female self esteem with a six step guide to feeling good again, then they have an interview with a celebrity who tells you its all make up, hard work and airbrushing, and then they tell you about the latest botox treatment.

Like the diet industry they are rather self perpetuating.

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Would it be possible to create a 'real' women's magazine that women would be actually motivated to read?

Imagine these cover features:

I wouldn't buy it!

Last edited: 23-11-2006 06:21:42 PM

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Why are real women boring?!!!

I could think of loads of stuff that's interesting to read about without resorting to the 'average'.

At the end of the day they are supposed to make us feel inadequate so that we feel we have to go out and buy the 'right' labels for the 'perfect' lifestyle

The problem is that we are supposed to fit into some kind of stereotype Stepford wife - which is why I find these magazines boring!!!

We've been fed this illusion for far too long.

Maybe there's a huge untapped market out there, who knows.....?

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Carl I dont think you would be the target audience really. And is that what you think about us ordinary women?

My gosh dont you know about the matching underware dilemas we go through, or top tips like stopping ladders running in your tights with nail polish

lol
S

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Many of these glossy magazines feed the Ego, or personality, the airbrushed models themselves often suffer from eating disorders, low self worth and self esteem, they are not "perfect" . If they have the "perfect body" does that make them healhy and whole? What about their OCD or Shopping/Sex/Drink Addiction.

Denial and unconsciousness is the biggest epidemic in todays society. The illusion is toxic and all pervasive in our society, affecting men, women and children. Every day there are miracles and positive things taking place and the media and glossies focus on the negative or materialistic. This smacks of fear and separation and results in dis-ease.

How refreshing to read about the real and genuine difficulties that we all experience, the challenges that have been overcome, the transformation that is possible that turn the ordinary into extra ordinary or make the ordinary worthwhile and mircaulous.


Society's conditioning is pervasive, its like a drip drip tap and its such a load of non-sense.

A couple of the "real" magazines that I love are; Kindred spirit, psychologies,

Have to confess to "a place in the sun" for a little bit of escapism now and then.

Kim x

Ps Jane you're dazzling me, keep shining :O)

Last edited: 24-11-2006 07:15:18 AM

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I'm concerned about this debate.

I get that you are three beautiful women.

I also get that magazines operate under a certain business model which includes all the terrible things stated - fear, lack and exploitation etc.

The fact that they exist does not make you - or the women featured - any less beautiful. It's just a game and this is a harsh old world sometimes.

The problem is your feelings and reactions. Why do you feel less beautiful (or whatever negative reaction)? What's living on inside you that responds so readily to that stuff? That's the place to do the work. The world of publishing is not interested in your problems and ideas unless it can exploit them (even Kindred Spirit).

(lecture over)

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Good news - Create you own holistic magazine


Mel Bezalel, a postgraduate journalism student at City University in London, is looking to launch a holistic magazine with a difference - and she wants your help. If the mags currently on the shelves don't suit your tastes, here's your chance to make a difference.

"We want it to look exciting and fresh, with superb photography, including features about getting readers to participate in new therapies and reporting back to us," says Mel who also wants to incorporate topics like food and travel.

If you have a few minutes, Mel would like you to fill in her questionnaire which will be presented to publishers very soon.

You can get involved at: http://holisticlocal.co.uk/forums/topics/view/453

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I won;t add to this topic but I have seen a little video that puts everythign into perspective about percieved beauty

Real Beauty

We are all beautiful..... even with big morning hair!

Asif
Grade two haircut all over

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Nice one Asif!


John ...Grade one all over

Last edited: 24-11-2006 11:01:09 AM

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You're missing something here...

I (and I'm sticking my neck out so far it's lkely to hurt) know in my own experience that a woman likes to look and feel good (beautiful) and that the shadow of fear, rejection may be nature's way of motivating that impulse.

Magazine's therefore might just be an awkward and commercial extension of that dynamic.

Asif - we are not all beautiful; not all the time anyway (although I have to say you have always been a handsome devil on the occasions we've met!).

Beauty is a quality that we can align with. It's not a given and constant work and vigilance is required, because all qualities - including cruelty and ugliness - are looking for a home too.

Last edited: 24-11-2006 11:54:45 AM

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Dear Carl

Im curious as to your definition of beauty.

My point is that we are all of us subject to conditioning and media telling us how we should look, live, etc.

Much of what is portrayed is superficial, skin deep and does not serve our evolution.

Lives are damaged and lost through this skin deep philosophy, separation and division and to lay the responsibility solely at the door of the individual seems unneccessary and less than compassionate.

I see that we have both an individual and a collective responsibility in this matter. We are all one, and our reactions, thoughts and feelings and behaviour affect us all.

Psychologies and Kindred Spirit and hopefully holistic magazines will be looking at the whole big picture and supporting our growth. Why continue to play a game that hurts/damages us all?

Dear Asif, thanks for your understanding on this topic and sharing such a powerful resource.

Its time for us all to wake up and see the bigger picture, to see through the illusions, to see more with our hearts. If you cant see the beauty you're not looking hard enough.

Love Kim

Last edited: 24-11-2006 01:40:33 PM

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An old friend of mine used to say, 'all women are beautiful, some are just more beautiful than others'.

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How is it that I can agree with eveyones comments? Must be the Libra thing going on!
Kimberley , you are so eloquent , as always - able to articulate exactly what I'm trying to say.

Carl , I do agree that if the weakness within us didn't exist then we would be unaffected by these magazines whatever they say - how come they can 'push our buttons?'
But when does the conditioning really begin? - its one of those chicken and egg things I suppose.

Ps Jon, not quite sure how to take the lillies in the pond and the last comment- but it made me laugh anyway! So Thank you!

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Guess I'm lucky because these magazines never make me feel worse about myself (oh dear hope this won't sound arrogant!) because I don't buy into the 'you must be beautiful to be worthy' concept. They do make me feel sad though because I look at the models and think it must be awful to only be seen as an ornament and as having no substance (which is reflected in their body - so skinny there is no substance to them) rather than as a complete person with depth and personality.

One of the sexiest women in our office is close to 50, she hasn't got a perfect figure (would guess at a curvy size 16) and has lines and wrinkles but she does have an amazing zest for life and wonderful sense of fun and I believe that is one of the most attractive things we can all develop. (It is probably why she also has the men in the office adoring her - if she ever lost her husband I am sure she would plenty of offers)

One of the perks of the day job is entertaining clients and introducers etc and time and again the men I come across lament how they cannot understand women's obession with being skinny as they 'don't know any men who prefer really skinny women' and how 'boring it is to take a woman out for dinner who is obsessed with what she is(n't) eating'.

Conclusion: Real men love Real Women with REAL Curves!

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i have to admit to being inclined to agree with carl

but at the end of the day, pick up a commercial publication and it will be funded by COMMERCIALS

and all of these commercials will be geared towards you buying something

if you believe you have any sort of deficit then you will get sold

the issue here is not the particular trip associated with women, its what happens when you want things to be different to how they are

contentment does not require assuaging

cameron

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I would like to quote some material that I found in 'The Beauty Myth' by Naomi Wolf (pub.1990) which I think makes for interesting reading on this debate:-

Why do women care so much about what the magazines say and show?
They care because , though the magazines are trivialized, they represent something very important: women’s mass culture.

What is seldom acknowledged is that they have popularized feminist ideas more widely than any other medium- certainly more widely than explicitly feminist journals. Twenty years ago the activists who demonstrated at the offices of ‘The ladies home journal’ offered a list of article ideas Instead of ‘’Zsa Zsa Gabor’s bed,’’they proposed ‘’How to get a divorce,’’ and ‘’Developments in daycare,’’ And it happened.
Seen in this light, the glossies have been very potent instruments of social change.

Women are deeply affected by what their magazines tell them ( or what they believe they tell them) because they are all most women have as a window on to their own mass sensibility

Newspapers relegate women’s issues to ‘women’s page’- TV news programming consigns ‘women’s stories’ to the daytime.
In contrast women’s magazines are the only products of popular culture that change with women’s reality, written by women for women about women’s issues, and take their concerns seriously.

Women also respond to the beauty myth aspect of the magazines because adornment is an enormous ( and often pleasing) part of female culture. And there is nowhere else where they can participate in women’s culture in such a broad way.

Because women trust their clubs and because this voice is so attractive, it is difficult to read the magazine with a sharp eye as to how thoroughly ad revenue influences the copy. It is easy to misread the whole thing- as if it were a coherent message from the editors telling women, ‘’you should be like this.’’
Some of the harm done to women comes out of this misunderstanding.
Indeed as one study found, ‘’our data suggest women are misinformed and exaggerate the magnitude of thinness in women through advertising in the diet industry.’’ What editors are obliged to appear to say that men want from women is actually what their advertisers want from women.

But womens magazines do not simply mirror our own dilemma of beauty.They intensify it. Even their editors worry that many readers have not learned how to separate out the pro-woman content from the beauty myth in the magazine (whose place is primarily economic.)

Last edited: 14-12-2006 10:24:51 AM

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