Not only did the book tell women they didn't need a man to be happy, but it also encouraged them to enjoy sex with whomever they damn well pleased — without guilt. Those two messages struck a chord: Helen's book was an instant best-seller, and unattached girls everywhere were so psyched that someone had finally spoken to them, they flooded her with thank-you notes — and begged her for personal advice. Helen realized that if she had her own magazine, she could answer all of these women at once, so she mapped out a proposal that explored her book's main messages.
I wanted to tell the truth : that sex is one of the three best things out there, and I don't even know what the other two are.
As soon as the mock-up was finished, she started shopping it around New York publishing companies. Rejection followed rejection, until Helen met with people at the Hearst company. The first issue to totally reflect Helen's vision was September , but the July '65 issue was the first she edited. So we wrote a cover line to that effect. From then on, the magazine continued to push the envelope with articles on provocative and often taboo topics like man-meeting vacations and extramarital affairs.
Soon it had a huge — and fiercely loyal — readership. It provided them with a vision and detailed advice on how to live a better life — on their own terms. While the revamped Cosmo was flying off the stands, the mag's empowering message was rubbing many men — and even a few women — the wrong way.
Many of Cosmo's opponents were saying 'Who the hell do these women think they are? Notify me of new posts via email. March issue Photo credit: Wikipedia. Share this: Twitter Facebook. Like this: Like Loading Leave a Reply Cancel reply Enter your comment here Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:.
Email required Address never made public. Name required. Follow Following. The Best Selling Women's Magazine. Sign me up. It might be "harrowingly explicit" but it's also completely useless as a sex manual. The advice it gives is all horrible, and the way they present it by suggesting 'hot surprises' instead of encouraging you to talk to your partner and actually find out what you'd both like is even worse. It's a gender role indoctrination manual that encourages insecurity and discourages communication across gender lines.
My wife used to get Cosmo for light reading. I leafed through it from time to time laughing at some of the absolutely ridiculous statements in the articles like "men don't like to cuddle.
Recently, supermarkets in my area have started obscuring the cover of Cosmo on the racks. I mean, it's not like Cosmo used to be less sexist. Maybe it was more intellectually stimulating, but weren't most of the stories written by men anyway? No guarantees of female empowerment there.
I think it's really fascinating how it's changed over the years, along with other non-lady-centric publications, but the "eugh, all it has these days is SEX MANUALS" commentary strikes me as not terribly progressive. One aspect of the continued popularity of Cosmo that needs to be taken into account is that the magazine wouldn't be printing the "articles" that it does if the readers didn't respond to them and purchase them due to the racy and sexist content.
If women don't want to be portrayed as a man's sexual object then maybe they shouldn't be reading a magazine that is teaching them how to be exactly that. Cosmo is only living up to the standards that we as a society are holding it to. That being said, sometimes women do want advice on sex and there is nothing wrong with that as long as it doesn't turn into a culture of women simply striving to please their men without any reciprocal reward.
And it would be nice if Cosmo branched out into other subjects that women are interested in, they could draw in a larger audience and thus more profits if they didn't so narrowly limit their content to one of a sexual nature. Via WM. Christie, the Senior Web Editor for Cosmopolitan. I think it's great you dug up those old covers For those of you interested in seeing more, I just wanted to pass on our online Cosmo Cover Gallery, which has covers from the past 10 years.
We really enjoy the older Cosmopolitan magazines. Stunning covers and great literature combined! They should bring back the illustrated cover and excellent literature. Make it smarter. Thanks for the excellent post. Please world, please see that sexuality is not a toy. Please see the pain and numbing effect that comes from a sex-saturated society.
It is a wonderful gift from God to enjoy, but of course we have to pervert it into something that hurts others and ruins lives. So what [ Brave, innovative and dare I say shrewd, oh and they happen to be beautiful women. Look at this glimpse of Cosmos evolution.
Audrey Hepburn was once the role model. With good reason-—she was strong, graceful and [ She was a figurehead of the sexual revolution, and she wanted women to feel sexually liberated. In order to survive, the magazines retool themselves or else they die. Cosmopolitan was first published in and was a type of literary magazine that published short stories and has evolved since […]. Cosmopolitan magazine was, back then, an icon…an iconic magazine that tempted in so many ways. The cover, let alone, made you want to buy the magazine.
The paper used back then was nothing like today. Back in the day, ,thank you to Helen Gurley Brown, made Cosmopolitan Magazine what it was, is and should still be today. In fact, it has been around for years, and over 50 years in its current, sexy style.
Getting girls to open up their bags and pocket books for a all girl power publication was easy. What was missing was a centerfold and a male feature including full on nudity. I still wonder why only graphic stories advice and language are inside yet no graphic art photography? Little girls read Cosmo. Real women read Playboy. I think that it's a cheap second rate failure..
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