Sex Doesn't Always Sell

I once wrote a scathing letter to a sports magazine I used to subscribe too. I had received my latest copy in the mail, had taken one look at the local C grade 'celebrity' on the cover clad in only a bikini and wondered - quite rightly too - what did this have to do with sport? Up till then, recent covers of the mag had been decidedly soft porn, so Eva the Vulgarian was the last straw as far as I was concerned.

I questioned the wisdom of having the magazine look no different to all the other soft core magazines bought by men who are too afraid to buy the mags in the plastic wrappers. Wouldn't it be better to have your magazine stand out on the news stand, rather than be lost in a see of airbrushed titties I asked? If you must stick with the theme I asked, why not have some of NZs champion sportswomen on the cover and promote a positive image of women?

To their credit the magazine printed my letter. The editors satirical reply hinged only on the premise that he suspected I was actually my wife, as both our names appear on our email. I guess he thought that no red blooded male would be complaining about a blonde in a string bikini. But he thought wrong.

To cut a long story short, the editor resigned a few months later (he now writes for a trashy Sunday paper). The new editor at the magazine changed the policy back to having actual sports people on the cover and the magazine seems to sell quite well these days. It is certainly a lot easier to find on the shelf. Proof then, that sex doesn't always sell.

Amusingly some IT magazines are yet to find that out though. Certainly nothing makes me more excited about my latest issue of Poindexter Monthly than a girl in a bikini holding a mother board on the cover.

See, I am a bit of an 'untypical' type of guy when it comes to things like this. But I don't believe I am the only one.

I enjoy rap music as much as the next frightened Caucasian, but the videos are absolutely disgusting. Not that this a phenomenon confined to rap music - soft core titillation is so mainstream these days that we've become numb to it. Yes, I realise that the women in the videos are paid for their time and do so by choice, but that doesn't make it right.

The ultimate irony to me is that rap 'musicians', who are predominantly Afro American, will rap lyrical about racial oppression and just how badly they're treated by the five-0, yet don't hesitate to promote women as being nothing more than possessions. What do their mothers think of all this I wonder?

How about the confused adolescent girl who gets her prompt on how she should act around boys from what she sees on MTV? What of the adolescent boy who does the same? How does he now expect to treat girls do you think? Skip forward down the chain of consequence with me a few steps - and now throw in the world wide web. Is it any wonder we have an ever increasing number of young girls exposing themselves (mentally and physically) online?

Parents should be playing a positive part in this type of scenario, but many don't. I especially applaud the mothers - and lets be honest here, it is the mother - who buys her 10 year old daughter the short skirt, knee high boots and padded bra combo. Allow me to offer some advice (it's free advice too): Your daughter is not a Barbie doll that you can dress provocatively in order to overcome your own self image anxieties! Just because you can't pull the outfit off, doesn't mean she should have to.

Now I don't necessarily believe there are more paedophiles around today than there were, say thirty years ago. Only now we make it more easier for the bastards to get their jollies by sexualising our kids - particularly our daughters.

So don't endorse anything that promotes the fallacy that soft porn is okay. Don't buy the crap the rappers record if their lyrics and videos continue to trash women. Don't buy the sports mag with the bikini on the front. Don't watch the incestuous programmes that portray life (and women) as being one big continuous shag. If enough people did, then the record company doesn't finance the crapper because his records don't sell. The sports mag returns to sports people on the front cover and the programme loses advertisers and eventually it's funding because no one is watching. It's that simple.

Most importantly, protect your kids. Sex doesn't always have to sell, not to your kids anyway. Don't dress your daughters like hookers. Clothes don't maketh the child, their innocence does.