"Imbeciles and Prostitutes"
Ruggles, Rebecca
English 101
Essay #3, Final Draft
Imbeciles and Prostitutes-
The typical reader of Maxim magazine is a pathetically lusty imbecile seeking photographs of nearly nude women and advice as to how best keep out of a committed relationship, or a superficial ditz looking to check out the upcoming month’s “one-hundred and one ways to act like a prostitute”. Maxim magazine’s advertisements target men specifically, despite the percentage of women who subscribe to the magazine. Maxim magazine features a plethora of articles featuring barely clothed women to, well, some more articles reminiscent of, but not quite, pornography. Disguised as a semi-serious magazine, Maxim throws in articles pertaining to popular culture, the occasional world event, car ratings, advice columns, as well as home recipes. However, all such articles manage to hint, or directly relate to womanizing. Maxim magazine is nothing more than garbage; shockingly acceptable by our society, Maxim will continue in sales as long as our society remains in moral stagnation.
“Oh man, I sure have a hankering to view some scantily-clad women inside an illicit magazine full of irrelevant articles about dream sandwiches that I’ll have my disappointing wife number three cook up for me after a round of beers with the boys”, is what I could imagine a typical male reader of Maxim magazine thinking. Inside this magazine the advertisements are all targeted towards men, even though a slight percentage of their readers are women. Adverts about clothing, the sexiest alcohol, the fastest cars, the most seductive cologne, and the newest electronic equipment to keep you en vogue are featured throughout. All advertisements in some way appeal to sex, especially those relating to cars and alcohol. Most of these said advertisements place women as the centerpiece, with the victorious male capturing said female with the advertised product in the background. Of course, none of these women are properly dressed and most, if not all, are far more attractive than the man they are featured with alongside the advertisement. This type of fantasy is playing to the average Joe, who could only vainly hope of seducing a pinup-woman like that displayed in the advert.
The articles in this magazine are no more tasteful than the advertisements; they are, in fact, far more repulsive than any commercial company would dare to go for fear of vast public indignation. Articles in this magazine span from interviews with pop icons, reviews relevant to popular culture such as movies and music items, world events, home recipes, advice columns, and fashion tips. Each and every such article, entirely without exception, is a pedestal of philandering. Maxim columnists cannot seem to make an article interesting to their readers without a practically nude female being featured somewhere alongside the content, or without some crack at the annoyance of having to treat a woman as if she is your equal. Oh, the horror. In the article “G.I. WHOA!” Maxim takes a shot at seriousness by highlighting a world event: the conditions of American troops in Iraq, but radically fails at journalistic integrity by talking about the life of a one enlisted female, dressed in army pants, boots, and hat, with a bright bikini top, posing in such a way that her bosom is the main focus of the picture. Even more unsettling is the object upon which she is perched: a missile. Any person with the slightest sense of sexual innuendos will have picked up on the pornographic suggestion of this position. The articles with interviews from pop icons inevitably lead to sex, with such risqué questions as: “How sexy is crème brûlée?” (“Hot and Fresh”, 103-106), “How long have you tried to play a lesbian?” (“Perfect Union”, 116-120). All interviews are conducted while the interviewee poses for pictures where she is in her underwear, in a sexually suggestive pose, where she can be found occasionally rubbing oils or dropping water onto herself. These interviews are entirely irrelevant to the interviewee’s career other than the exposure, both literally and metaphysically, that they will be getting from posing in such a way. The most poignant such interview was taken with Nicolette Sheridan, a popular actress, in the article “Home Wrecker”. This interview, in the beginning, asked serious questions about her career on the show “Desperate Housewives” that quickly lead to questions about “catfight fantasies”, “hot wax”, and the promiscuity of other leading pop icons. This article was particularly ironic in that while Nicolette Sheridan was posing in the most suggestive clothing and poses out of every other girl in the magazine, she was quoted saying that she found a commercial Paris Hilton made to be “trashy”, immediately followed with a comment about herself and how she is able to get a “good tan naked”. Obviously, this magazine is directly targeting men who have no interest in the actual events of popular culture, or world events, but rather, how many women are getting naked in the process.
Advice columns, while submitted by men on two occasions, being “Sandwich Craft”, the competition for the most suitable sandwich to achieve the heartiest “gut-buster”, and “Deliver a Baby”, how to best deliver a baby in an emergency to save on hospital bills, are hugely contributed to by the female readers of Maxim magazine. Surprisingly, these advice columns all relate to how to best manipulate a woman through “101 Things You Need To Know About Women” to how to most cunningly “Sidestep Commitment”. In “101 Things You Need To Know About Women” it is suggested that “Every woman is self-conscious about her ass. Tell her that you love her ass and you’ll see it more often”. In “Sidestep Commitment”, a female-reader of Maxim suggests “Girls read into body language. To avoid a future talk, combine affection with sweet but vague comments. She’ll take it as a good sign.” It is unclear as to what these women are trying to accomplish by revealing to men the many ways in which they can manipulate them in order to obtain sex without commitment, but they are offering it up willingly, like the harlots in the magazine that they admire.
Maxim magazine is nothing short of filth; ignorant blathering polished with nude centerpieces are the main and only feature of this magazine that is targeted largely to a male audience. Ironically, women are also drawn, and targeted, to this magazine by the desire to achieve some degree of fame by either taking their clothes off, or betraying their sex. Maxim will flourish as long as the taste of its readers remains unsavory.