Cosmopolitan’s advice is racy enough, but should it splash young stars on its covers alongside its sex tips? Some outspoken women think it’s time Cosmo was sold to adults only.
Cosmopolitan magazine has been steaming up mailboxes, magazine racks and newsstands for years. And some say it’s gotten too hot for public consumption—even at a glance—with its cover promises that regularly offer ways to satisfy your man, experience your best orgasm, or give insight into all the sex moves he secretly craves.
Such advice is better left under wraps—at least where the eyes of the less sexually experienced are concerned. And that’s why William Randolph Hearst’s granddaughter Victoria Hearst and model Nicole Weider are leading the charge to bag Cosmo and relegate it to the adult magazine section.
But it’s nothing to do with what’s going on in your bedroom. Rather it’s trying to prevent the oversexing of America’s youth between its racy advice alongside the use of barely of legal age stars Dakota Fanning, Selena Gomez and Demi Lovato as very grown-up looking cover girls.
The three have been featured on covers just this year, and some question whether it’s appropriate for young stars with a young—and younger fan base—to grace a magazine well-known for its adult content.
Lovato, 19, is on the latest issue, July 2012, which boasts on the cover “A Bonus Section So Hot They Made Us Seal It.” But there’s no age warning or rating hinting to the info it contains—either on the cover or on the insert. Inside, the bonus section merely invites readers to rip open the perforated seal.
The insert discusses everything you wanted to know—or didn’t—about a man’s anatomy. Irreverently previewed on the Today show by Kathie Lee and Hoda last week, the section shares average numbers on length, and the states with the longest and shortest, um, members.
Keep in mind this is just a booklet on the inside of an otherwise freely accessible issue on your local newsstand. And, once purchased—or whether certain readers want to pry before they buy—who’s to say the ones breaking the seal of the steamy insert or who come across one already broken are old enough or mature enough to be reading it?
That’s why Hearst and Weider want to quit taking chances on Cosmo’s content getting into underage hands. They say it’s time to bag the magazine and put it where it really belongs: the adult section.
Do you agree?