Hard News: Women and their representations
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Fooman, in reply to
+1 to the power of 1 million
Ahem, in other words, 1?
I'll get me coat....
FM
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Nat, in reply to
You forgot: also, you might be too fat.
But why do people buy them? (A genuine question ... I don't, neither does anyone in my immediate family)
EDIT: although given that jezebel post - perhaps they are worth it for the satire...
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Emma Hart, in reply to
EDIT: although given that jezebel post - perhaps they are worth it for the satire...
Sounds like you might enjoy cosmocking.
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In terms of women's magazines, Marie Claire is one I can stomach, because they write good meaty articles. Of course, you have to page past 200-odd pages of glossy ads, but some people like pretty dress pics in amongst the meaty reading.
As for Bindel, I wish the Guardian would piss her off. It's tedious when you click on a potentially-interesting headline without noticing the byline, and then having to hit the back-button.
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Nat, in reply to
Sounds like you might enjoy cosmocking.
Ha! Great comments too.
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Hebe, in reply to
How and why the fuck does Julie Bindel keep getting a soapbox?
Jeez I thought the dyke dinosaurs were extinct. Choice and acceptance of whatever shade of grey happens to float your origami owl; why is that so hard for the Bindels of this world to take? (Barring those hobbies that cause non-consensual harm of course.) No difference between Bindel and a moral majority hypocrite in my eyes.
Who buys Cosmo? My mother.
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Hebe, in reply to
In terms of women's magazines
Australian Women's Weekly once or twice a year for the awfulness of the "how many years can you recycle Susan Renouf and Maggie Tabberer" articles.
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Craig Ranapia, in reply to
In terms of women’s magazines, Marie Claire is one I can stomach, because they write good meaty articles.
It’s the Vanity Fair Rationalization, which is descended from the “I buy Playboy for the stories and interviews – which I never ever whack off over” Plea. :)
But here's a fascinating and troubling conundrum. Pick up a copy of any edition of Vogue, arguably the most influential masthead in fashion media. Every picture ultimately selected by a group of female editors of whom the youngest is 45.(Grace Coddington the creative director of the US edition is 71). And to a woman they'd rather eat broken glass than put a contemporary on the cover.
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Hebe, in reply to
It’s the Vanity Fair Rationalization, which is descended from the “I buy Playboy for the stories and interviews – which I never ever whack off over” Plea. :)
But here's a fascinating and troubling conundrum. Pick up a copy of any edition of Vogue, arguably the most influential masthead in fashion media. Every picture ultimately selected by a group of female editors of whom the youngest is 45.(Grace Coddington the creative director of the US edition is 71). And to a woman they'd rather eat broken glass than put a contemporary on the cover.I give in: I read the AWW a couple of times a year for the 'marvelous mince meals' features and advice on what to do with my old toilet roll cores.
That Vogue thing: It could be because the editrixes are not trying to reflect their own lives but what they perceive to be their readers' aspirations and secret fears; ie they want to sell mags. First thing I was told by an old pro when I started in journalism: "This is a fucking industry first. We're here to make money. And if we're fucking lucky we get to do some good journalism."
The Fairfax and News Limited razoring in Australia this week reinforces to me that the mainstream media in any form has not got the appetite nor margins to create change nowadays, but the new internet media can. And when new media has popularised or made something acceptable or unacceptable, the mainstream old media will follow.
But to create that change will take either unpaid or unrewarded effort on the net, or people like me will have to harden up and pay for consistent and long-term access to intelligent and provocative discourse. -
Rob Stowell, in reply to
I’ve been thinking something like that this week. The newspapers are dying!
It’s a little scary, but is it so bad? Newspaper ownership is so concentrated- often in the hands of such hard-ass right-wing fanatics :) – it’s hard to mourn their financial demise.
Except we know many good journalists will be out of work, and important stories won’t be heard.
Internet media is almost bound to be more diverse, with more distributed ownership. A small group – or an individual- can do a lot of journalism and publishing.
Where the $ will come from is still the big issue.
I look at Werewolf from time to time, but I haven’t been big-hearted enough to dip into the credit card. (Partly because they ask for a regular payment, and auto payments make me squirmy. I can never guarantee there’ll be money in an account at some random time, for a start. I’d really like a system that encourages micropayments- $1-$6 bucks, what you might pay for a paper or magazine, with a couple of clicks, when I choose.)
NZ is unlikely to get the number of eyeballs that’s allowed TPM to prosper on advertising alone (or mostly).
So subscription or some form of payment? Buuuut- can’t see myself paying to access stuff or Teh Harald. And (as all the experiments have shown) paywall = no links…. because it’s almost discourteous to link to something people can’t see without paying. And no links = less readers and…
So we are entering (backwards) a new era for journalism. And the one thing I feel sure of- it makes good public broadcasting- that’s you, RNZ!- much much more important.
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Hebe, in reply to
It's a little scary, but is it so bad?
Not for me because I don't own an old media outlet and I'm no longer depending on a journo wage. I would equate the destruction and the possibilities of the "new" media environment with the similar position of Christchurch CBD. It's difficult and scary and an unknown future, but the possibilities opened up are exciting and appear huge, especially for smaller groups and individuals.
I like the idea of micro-payments -- like the 99c e-books. I wonder if 20c a story would work?I could probably do something like that for PA; or a fiver a month sub for my faves.
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Sacha, in reply to
women telling women what men like
in general
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Rob Stowell, in reply to
I wonder if 20c a story would work?I could probably do something like that for PA; or a fiver a month sub for my faves.
Free-lance rates in NZ being so ridiculously lucrative, you'd need at least half-a-dozen subscribers to break even :)
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Hebe, in reply to
I meant I could pay, not write!
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Kumara Republic, in reply to
Sounds like you might enjoy cosmocking.
Closer to home, we had this several years back...
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
The Great Helmsman appears to have lost his bowsprit.
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Craig Ranapia, in reply to
That Vogue thing: It could be because the editrixes are not trying to reflect their own lives but what they perceive to be their readers’ aspirations and secret fears; ie they want to sell mags
And being the house Tory, I have absolutely nothing against selling shit. Anna Wintour doesn't get paid US$2 million a year because she's a really nice lady who's worked for Conde Nast a really long time.
She runs a magazine with an average monthly circulation of 1.25 million and has the kind of ad/editorial ratio and page rates most industry execs would sacrifice their first born sons for.
But I'm not sure "it's what the readers want" isn't circle-jerky self-fufilling bullshit as often as not. It's 2012 - are fashionistas really nauseated by the sight of non-white models who've hit puberty and aren't size zero? Maybe they are, But US Vogue didn't go into receivership after putting a (gasp!) black model on the cover in August 1974. Elsewhere in the magazine world, the publishers of Men's Health (2011 av. monthly circulation of the US edition - a shade under 1.8 million) don't accept liquor or tobacco advertising - that was a choice too and that doesn't seem to have put readers off.
I know I'm dreaming, but I think it would make a real difference if Vogue put out a joint memo that they'd try running reality-sized editorial with a better range of "ethnic" (guess what that's code for) models for a while. Conde Nast might be surprised by the results - if only they had the corporate ovaries.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
Stitched up...
....you might enjoy cosmocking
After reading the entertaining sub-Burroughsian Jezebel cut-up piece, I was struck by the apparent dearth of sewing and patterns in the current range of women's mags.
Somewhere I have a box of those marvellous Burda patterns on tissue paper with 3 garments overlaid in 3 colours - high art!
Were we to conjoin Needlework, Jezebel and Cosmo we might end up with a lively 'cut'n'tucker' take on cock-smocking - though it would almost certainly be curtains for the bloke!
Bloody frill seekers.... -
Kracklite, in reply to
OK I fed some of these into the travesty generator and the output was about as intelligible as the input
William Burroughs would love that on so many levels.
Depending on the level of garbling you dial in, you can get a pretty good Lovecraft pastiche out of it too.
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
Were we to conjoin Needlework, Jezebel and Cosmo we might end up with a lively 'cut'n'tucker' take on cock-smocking
There was an address in an old Whole Earth Catalog for a San Francisco mail order outfit called The Giant Dwarf. The sole item they offered was a codpiece sewing pattern, with the slogan "Forget those stupid blouses - sew a sensible codpiece!"
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Lilith __, in reply to
a better range of “ethnic” (guess what that’s code for) models for a while
Vogue Italia did a whole issue with only black models back in 2008. As Jezebel notes, that wasn’t including the ads.
Ian: I too remember Burda though I was too flummoxed by the layered outlines to cut out any of the patterns! I knew a few people who did, though. Frill seekers, indeed. ;-)
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17:30 and still no mention of Wham! reforming...
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JoJo,
I just watched Thursday's episode of Media7. It's great to see the stereotypes in our advertising and media being discussed - but to the adman who said that everyone loves the "little bit sexist" Tui ads: You can fuck right off. They're awful. They make me cringe. Just because there's no subtlety to the sexism, just because it's upfront and out there, doesn't make it more acceptable. It just makes me think "Tui - a beer for men who only watch commercials involving women in a bikinis."
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Lilith __, in reply to
“Tui – a beer for men who only watch commercials involving women in a bikinis.”
Yes, I think there's a fine line between irony and just perpetuating the same old crap. Much better to come up with something new and creative!
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I thought it was interesting that commenters here have been so negative about the gossip, beauty, sex and fashion magazines aimed at women. The NZWW editor seems to sincerely believe that the WW is a feminist magazine. And all the thousands of women who buy it must get something out of it.
Are PA readers not part of the target demographic? What makes us different? Because there's clearly a divergence.
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