I read the article on the Glamour link. It's a great piece of journalism, to see all these incidents I'd heard about in bits and pieces, spelled out at once. When I combine that with my own memories of inaccurate sexual health information from my own teen years (girls who took their friend's pill for a few days and thought they were "safe", and any number of other bits of teen "wive's tales" that travelled my school hallways)... That's scary.

I can understand the government having an agenda. That's their right as a right-wing government. Everyone's allowed an opinion. But to publish outright lies on sites that are scientific in nature... that's really scary. What a strange world we live in. It outlines my job as a parent (of grade school kids at the moment, but I know they'll be teens far sooner than I'm ready for it). I can't rely on anything they'll learn at school... I'll have work hard to counter whatever misinformation is travelling the kid-network at the time.

Thanks for the heads-up.

That's funny -- I finally stopped reading women's magazines because I was tired, not of the "you must have this new lipstick!" chirpiness, but of the continual "Fifty ways you're about to die but your doctor won't tell you," "How Men Are Killing Young Women This Month," and similar articles. The scare-mongering, even when based in fact, that seems to imply women are in constant danger and must be protected is what I find most annoying about the entire genre. (And I'm hardly a fan of the medical industry's treatment of women.)

I couldn't disagree more with Lynn Harris's assertion that " even if women's magazines aren't your thing, consider that dismissing them out of hand doesn't help anything "for women" get taken seriously."

Huh? The article blurbs on the cover of Cosmo and Glamour are almost exclusively devoted to how to lose weight, how to drive him crazy in bed, how to figure out what he's thinking, how to put on make up , how to firm up, how to get attention and self esteem through massive consuming of clothing, outrageously expensive handbags and shoes, and a creme- or powder-baesed product for every feature and square inch of skin. Go ahead and buy three issues of each for the next three months. Make an excel spreadsheet with three columns: Dumb tips about sex, dumb tips about makeup, dumb tips about weight loss, and Other (content telling you that you aren't thin/pretty/confident/smart/successful enough but here's how to fix it). I guarantee you you won't have many, if any, homeless cover blurbs - these categories about cover the terrain.

I reject this terrain as 'for women'. It's for vain numskulls. Sure, it's a nice brainless way to pass the time during the occasional plane trip. But has anyone hever finished a magazine like that and felt edified at ALL? Much less truly entertained? I always feel slightly slimed, and think what a waste of time and money (not to mention brain cells).

I refuse to concede that just because that's what's out there 'for women' is somehow justifiable, because we must defend anything under the 'for women' banner or we're not good women. Bullshit. Those magazines create and prey on insecurity. The message is: you are always a work in progress, you need endless fixing, and we have endless products for you to buy (including the content that is our 'editorial' product) to fix you.

I don't buy into this, and I don't buy the crappy women's magazines. It's not for any women *I* know or want to know. Yes, I DO dismiss it out of hand - and I will continue to do so, until something decen takes it's place. If we don't dismiss the crap, there will never be any room for anything better under the banner of 'for women'. So let's make room, else we women we'll forever be marginalized as the witless consumers of Lifetime, Cosmo and Glamour.

I grew up in a religious home where the only mentions of sex was "don't do it till you are married" and this in San Francisco. Yeah, that was gonna happen. So my mother barred me from all sex education classes, refused to leave me alone with my doctors so I could ask them private questions, she would be there watching my pap smears. If a doctor asked if I had been sexually active she would say "absolutely not!" which just wasn't true.

The way I found out about Planned Parenthood and the free Haight St Clinic in SF -Cosmo

The way I found out about how to control my incontinence with Kegel exercises, and frankly I didn't even really know that the urine that would leak out when I sneezed violently was due to weak vaginal muscles, I had never even thought to ask my doctor about it because it was embarassing -Cosmo

The way I found out what that clear waterey crap that came out during orgasm was, I didn't know females could ejaculate until guess what-Cosmo

The way I found out about how different birth control worked, how to obtain it, the percentage rates of effectiveness -Cosmo

The way I found out about different STD's, how they were contracted -Cosmo

Hell Cosmo is one of the reasons that I am determined to have a pap smear every year, no matter what.

My mothers insistence on refusing me any sexual information didn't spur me to learn on my own, it was by reading my girlfriends "girly magazines" that I realized all the information I didn't have and needed to know. I have done research on my own and even as an adult I stay as informed as time will allow. The Glamour article was good, but it didn't tell me anything I didn't already know, that's how important it is to me to keep informed, but I do know the reality is that most girls or women are not going to go out and get educated about their reproductive organs. I've been in the gym hearing women still saying how anti-persperant can give you breast cancer, because your sweat doesn't leave your body and stagnates in your breasts, that's how uniformed a lot people are of their own physiology. My mother's refusal of information has made me determined to not let the same thing happen to my children.

If it wasn't for Cosmo, I don't know what I would have done as a teen, probably get half ass info from my friends who were allowed to take sex ed.

Sure girly magazines are all about selling you stuff, so is almost every magazine on the stands. And yes, girly magazines can be shallow and insipid and vain, but for some women, they may be the only place where they stumble across important info they didn't know they needed.

I'm not saying hey ladies, pick up a subscription, but a once in while purchase may be more benificial than you know.