I applaud the new management at The Source Magazine, who have announced that they are no longer running "booty ads" in thier publication—-but I wonder when Jet Magazine will stop running the "Booty of The Week" page. Oops, I'm sorry. It's "beauty," not booty. My bad. "It's time the hip-hop industry stop advertising junk and be more responsible about what we sell to our readers," says publisher Londell McMillan. "The Source has been much more selective about what we put in our magazine and created higher standards since we've changed ownership."
I wish they'd step up the editorial content too. But I digress.
By "booty ads," I imagine the Source Magazine mean those little one-ince square adverts for pornography, massage services, stipper reels and the like. They are doing this ostensibly to fight against the "misogynist" nature of hip-hop culture. But don't twist it— I think there are pracitical reasons for not having that many porno ads in your mag. Brothers in the joint read The Source, but aren't allowed to receive magazines with anything that could construed as pornography, I am told. So cutting out the ads could very well make thier sales jump. Management says they are hoping that manistream ads will rush in to fill the space left by the booty ads, but as print dies in the throes of a recession, I wish them well with that. But while we're mounting up on morality horses, I have another question.
I've always wondered why Jet Magazine has never caught a knock for, appropos of nothing, dropping half-naked black women in the middle of thier publication, compete with measurements and everything. We boycott and picket hip-hop artists and publications for thier exploitation of women, but Jet gets a pass? Really? How do you scream on a generation of young men raised on Jet Magazine for blithely objectifying black women and not call the old schol heads on the carpet as they continue to hunt for "models" to grace thier pages? We could argue that Jet's Beauty Girls are done up tastefully, but this is highly subjective. Comparing Jet Beauty Sydney Nicole-Livingston in Jet and Buffie the Body may come to down to hip-to-waist ratio and little else. We can't hate on Buffie because she's well-endowed—she is as God made her, right? I'm confused as to how pictures of half-naked black women often too young to know how this could impact thier lives illuminates the content of Jet or serves a greater purpose to Da Struggle. When I want to see half-naked black women, there are magazines I buy for that. But in pubs like XXL, The Source and Jet Magazine, I have no use for it. It serves no greater editorial purpose. That said, if there is a war on sexism and the senseless objectification of women, then, as the father of a daughter, I'm for it. Giddy-up. But what's good for the hip-hop goose is good for the old-school gander.
Jet Magazine should lose the Beauty of The Week.
Right Now.
Single Father, Author, Screenwriter, Award-Winning Journalist, NPR Moderator, Lecturer and College Professor. Habitual Line-Stepper