Recently a lot has been said about lads magazines. The Co-op is threatening to stop selling some of them, and a few campaigns are going on to diminish their presence (No More Page 3 and Lose the Lads Mags probably being the two most visible ones).
I have been asked my opinion on it by a couple of people. I have thought about it. And here's the thing: I don't know what to think. I have no clue what my opinion is on the subject.
On the one hand, I don't feel very affected by these magazines. The supermarket where I do my shopping has the magazine stand in a part of the shop that I can easily avoid, but even when I've gone over to look at the magazines (I am a sucker for gossip and fashion even though it's been years since I bought a magazine) lads mags haven't jumped out at me. Maybe because I'm so used to seeing women expose themselves, but most probably because I'm quite simply not very interested. It's the same thing with porn: some people are turned on, some people are grossed out, I get bored after the first ten minutes or so. The way lad mags depict women, the way (mainstream) porn depicts women, bores me. I don't find it attractive, in the sense that I don't feel the need to look at it at all. On this side of the argument, when someone tells me that they think lads mags should be banned, my answer is to shrug and reply "You don't have to read them, why do you care if anyone else does?".
On the other hand, there's the attitudes these magazines promote, and the ideas they put into people's heads about what is normal and what isn't. I'll explain myself: there are people (women and men) who fantasize about rape. That's fine with me. There's people who will make movies or write stories about rape, and there's people who will watch these movies and read these stories, and enjoy them. That's also OK with me. Until one of these people start regarding rape as the norm, and they decide that raping someone is just another way to have sex. Then I start questioning whether making movies where rape is depicted as a normal way to have sex is OK. But then, what's the solution? Making it illegal to watch or distribute these movies? That's what has been done with child pornography, but in child pornography a child is being abused: a child is being used in a sexual way when they haven't yet fully realised their sexuality. In the case of rape depictions the story changes. Films containing rape and stories containing rape are usually made by consenting adults (in the case of stories, it is quite usual to indicate at the beginning of the story that all characters in the story are over 18 and consenting adults), and they are meant to be consumed by consenting adults. Illegalising them would be censure in my opinion. And here's where I am at loss: I don't think making something illegal, censoring something, is a solution. But I don't know what would be.
A good sex education, and more than that, a good consent education is important. It is important to teach children, and teenagers, and adults, that you can't do things to another person without having their consent, their approval. Also, that noone should do anything to them without their consent and their approval. A good education in consent would probably solve some of the problems posed by porn and lads mags. A good sex education would help in making people (especially teenagers and young adults) realise what is realistic when it comes to sex and what is hyped up by porn or lads magazines, and it would help normalise attitudes towards sex and sex partners.
But all this avoids the real question when it comes to lads mags or porn: are they sexist? Because in the end, this is the real issue. The answer is fairly straightforward: yes. They are sexist. They are magazines made by men for men, and there is very little equivalent available for women. In any case, even if an equivalent for women existed, there is the problem that these types of magazines reduce women (and men, where the counterparts exist) to their bodies, and even to parts of their bodies. Sometimes I wonder whether this is really a problem. Who cares? We are reductionist by nature, we tend to see only little parts of a whole, we don't know things completely, we are human. But then... It's not wrong to reduce once in a while. The problem comes in when we start reducing every time. We all make judgements, and we all make judgements based on appearance, after all, it's the first thing we can see about someone. But this is a whole sex/gender/whatever you want to call it (I guess gender would be most appropriate in this case) reduced to their appearances a lot more than the other. And that is by definition sexist.
Now, let me tell you a secret: I pity the guys who read lad mags and actually believe that that's what women should be like (I also pity girls who read Cosmo and believe that any of what's in it reflects reality). See, here's the thing: "hot" isn't the same as attractive. Many of the "hot" guys I know are... dull? Not exactly. Simply, they aren't very engaging. Many of the attractive guys I know, on the other hand, may not be hot (a few of them are downright ugly when it comes down to it), but hey, they can keep up a conversation, they have a sexy smile, there's something about them that makes me want to keep listening. (Then there's the rare thing, the hot and attractive guy, and then I'm afraid I'm lost for words, and I just nod like an idiot while staring). My point is, I think there is a lot more to attractiveness than the physical, and I can't help but suspect that people who reduce a person to their physical attributes are just missing out. But I can't stop them.
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