Sunday, May 6, 2012

25 Tips to Get the Perfect Guy: How Cosmopolitan Constructs Gender Stereotypes


As many movies and TV shows have shown how they enforce stereotype gender roles, magazines and advertisements are other channels in which the media promote gender stereotypes. In particular, the popular magazines such as Cosmopolitan, which appeals to women, idealize both femininity and masculinity. Many of the women in these magazines appear to be thin, have the perfect bone structure and have flawless skin. On the other hand, men appear to be muscular and attractive. Having these pictures on almost every page of the magazine define and ultimately naturalizes the media’s meaning of what is beautiful and attractive.


Something I thought was ironic was that according to the article, “Cosmopolitan Magazine and Gender Stereotypes:How Cosmo Influences Its Readers’ Self Image”, Cosmopolitan claims to provide relationship advice. However, much advice applies almost exclusively to heterosexual relationships. Titles for articles on advice include: “How to Get Him to…” or “Be a Man Magnet” clearly assumes that all women are attracted to men.  The magazine rarely includes information for those in gay/lesbian or bisexual relationships. This focus on heterosexuality is perpetuated to young readers, leading them to think that homosexual relationships are non-existent or wrong.

Another interesting point that this article brings up is that many of the women featured in the magazines conform to media’s standards to beauty. Many of the models are thin with perfect bodies. Some of these advertisements have been condemned as creating an unrealistic image of beauty. As a result, female readers internalize these images and may buy the various cosmetics or even go through cosmetic surgery to correct certain ‘flaws’. An effort promoting healthy beauty is  the Dove "Real Beauty" campaign. According to the article,

“The Dove "Real Beauty" campaign is a bold and refreshing attempt to promote a healthy body image for women by using average women in their advertisements instead of models.”

Already, this statement sets up the binary of models and average women. This effort was created in order to promote beauty for ‘average women’. It poses the question of whether ‘average women’ are beautiful to begin with. Ironically, Dove’s parent compant, Unilever, also markets products for losing weight such as Slim Fast. 


Ultimately, by bombarding their readers with myriad body images that are deemed to be beautiful and attractive, magazines such as Cosmopolitan are creating gender ideals that their readers strive for. These ideals are representative of what is beautiful and what isn’t.

What do you think of Cosmopolitan’s focus on sexuality? Do you think that this a form of female empowerment?

12 comments:

  1. To answer your question of whether Cosmopolitan's focus on sexuality is empowering to females, I believe it doesn't. Even though I am guilty of reading these magazines, (I actually happen to have the second issue you posted with Khloe Kardashian as the cover,) I question why I even choose to read them when I feel so bad about myself afterwards. If somehow I was supposed to feel empowered, then why don't I feel more confident after scanning through one of these magazines? And I'm not the only one who feels this way: In one of my HD 1170 lectures, my professor mentioned a study about the difference between news-centric magazines and beauty magazines, (such as Cosmopolitan) on women's self image. It was found that women felt significantly worse about themselves after viewing a beauty magazine than after reading one about news. In addition, although some advertisements included in the magazines make an effort to promote healthy body images, there just simply aren't enough to overcome the "perfection" advertisements of the magazine.

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  2. Oh, and I also found it interesting how both issues you posted had the words "sex" and "naked" in huge letters. I guess in order to obtain the interests of women, "sex" and "naked" must be included. This leads me to believe that the makers of magazines feel that women's utmost priorities is to be capable of unbelievable sex and look thin/flawless while doing it.

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    1. I do not find it a coincidence that both magazine covers have the words "sex" or "naked". In fact, the word "sex" is almost on every issue as I look through the monthly Cosmo issues my housemate has. I think that this huge emphasis on sex and heterosexuality shows how much the media influences everyday people in their sexual choices. I agree with you that there is a close association with sex and beauty, specifically looking thin and modelesque.

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    3. I agree that media has a big influence on body image, but I do think that many measures are being taken every day to change this. I mean look at Khloe on the cover, she's not your typical size 2 model. She's sexy and curvy and comfortable in her own skin. Also, I think that Cosmo especially needs to be taken with a grain of salt. In the last decade, it's only topics have been sex and heterosexual relationships and that's it. And even when taking into consideration that specific audience that reads it only a handful take advice from what they read. But at the same time, these sorts of media DO influence everyday choices and actions. I think It'll take some time, but one day there will most likely be something like cosmo, but for homosexual relationships and all.

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  3. All beauty magazines support objectification and define beauty to some degree. I would say that Cosmo does this a bit more than most. Again, I do want to point out that the objectification is not limited to women. Have you seen the men in the magazine, not to mention that the spine of the magazine has a portion of a picture. When you put all of the years issues together, you have a picture of a really hot half naked man.

    Dove is at least making an effort to fight these standards, which I think is commendable. Though I never thought of it making a models/average people binary. That is a really interesting thought, and pretty true after thinking about it. It supports a false dichotomy of beauty instead of recognizing the different aspects and types of beauty. But something is said about a society that probably wouldn't buy the magazine if the people were "ugly". We don't want standards of beauty forced on us, yet we still put ourselves in that situation.

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  4. I completely see where you are coming from. Like the comments above, I too, sometimes like to indulge in a Cosmo Magazine. However, after reading your post and skimming the article on Cosmo, it has become clear that these gender stereotyping is a very high issue within this magazine. When reading Cosmo many of the articles pertain to appearances, relationships, etc. However, there are some articles that I can remember having to do with the working woman, or powerful appearances, and how to gain certain things you are working towards. Even though they are clearly aiding in the problem with gender stereotyping, they are often times attempting to make the woman a powerful individual, simply a women who is attractive while being successful. It's kind of a twisted skewed idea they are placing into women's heads, but in the end of the day they still are selling many magazines.

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  5. I'm not sure if you were already saying this or not, but Dove is basically distinguishing between average women and models. This has the potential to be considered calling average women not beautiful, but I think Dove does a good job of establishing that BOTH models AND average women are beautiful. Average women are simply not models. Which, I hope, is neither a surprise nor offensive to anyone not living under a rock. What I think Dove could do a better job of, however, is putting some average MEN in their ads. For example: me. I currently don't have a summer job, and modeling would be awesome. Granted, my luscious locks have been MIA lately, but I'm sure we can work around that.

    I digress...

    Confession: I've read cosmo cover-to-cover three times in my life. Once, during a very slow day at work (I used to work in a grocery store). Again, with an ex-girlfriend. And once, because its funny and interesting to see what girls like to read about, and what they think guys enjoy in bed. My point is, if more than one male on this earth is turning to this particular magazine in order to better understand the female psyche, said magazine had BETTER get its facts straight! If you women don't agree with the messages it's sending, do something to change it! For the sake of men worldwide, and thus, for your sake as well! (or vice versa)

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    1. I have always appreciated the Dove commercials and advertisements as they show that models are not real women, REAL WOMEN are real women. The things that people can do with photoshop these days... have you seen the Dove commercial on it? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hibyAJOSW8U They literally cut down how fake and distorted the female body image is that the media gives us. I am glad that there is at least one company who negates this type of self-esteem opression that is put on women through things like magazines, tv shows, commercials, etc.

      I, personally, cannot say that I have ever read Cosmo. I am not really a big magazine person and never have been. I also severely despise how targeted women are by things like this and want to see "real women" put their input into these magazines, not just the few people in power who write whatever they think will sell.

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  6. I'm pretty sure every single issue of Cosmopolitan has the word SEX in bold caps on the cover. I found this article (see the bottom of this comment for the link!) where the author made interesting observations about the messages the words on the covers of both Cosmo and Maxim are sending. The most interesting concept to me in the article is the tag cloud of all the words on the cover. Sex is clearly the most used word on both covers. In addition, the tag cloud from Cosmo in the 70's also provides some interesting insight. Sex is still a large contender, but it is nowhere near the most frequently used, and is beaten out by "women", "men", "new", "novel", and "stories". What has changed in our society since then so that all the media thinks we are interested in is sex? Is this new focus on sex empowering or degrading towards females? Some would probably argue that it is actually breaking stereotypical gender roles, because it sends the message that women are allowed to have sexual appetite, as opposed to the typical idea that "all men want is sex", and that women are just the objects of their lovemaking. However, is marketing sex to women actually empowering, or not at all?

    ARTICLE: http://www.darrenbarefoot.com/archives/2010/08/what-are-the-messages-of-cosmo-and-maxim.html

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  7. First off, I'm from Lirette's hip-hop class but I found this post to be very interesting. Being a guy, I normally don't ever bother to look toward the magazine section of a store when I walk by, but one of my lady friends was reading an issue of Cosmo in our dorm lounge and I was curious to see what this magazine was saying on what how a girl should do to "get her man." After about 5 seconds of reading, I just started laughing. Almost everything I read was completely ridiculous and from my outside perspective it seemed to be so demeaning to females. I was expecting to read something logical, but everything seemed to have the same message, "change what you're doing and who you are so you can be with a guy who likes you for your superficiality." And honestly, most of the things under that section are way too ridiculous to even work...

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  8. It seems so terrible that magazines would tell girls, some of them young, how to change themselves just to get men. But then again, wanting to be the prettiest girl in class or the most muscular guy in class is part of who we are as people. Even animals want to be attractive. Female peacocks are more attracted to male with long feathers rather than ones with short feathers. Society will always have a factor in determining what beauty means. Having said that, magazines like Cosmo promote this kind of idea that one must look like Miss America to get a guy, which is not true at all.
    And about what Dove is doing to try and change the perception of beauty with its campaign is meant well, but not well thought out, as you point out Courtney. I feel that Dove would be better to say that they are "real" instead of "average". "Real" gives a sense of power, while the term "average" is kind of insulting.
    Ultimately, if we want to make beauty "real", we will have to not care some much about what a magazine thinks and instead focus on we we believe beauty means.

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