Courtesy of my female roommate, the March 2008 issue of Cosmopolitan has graced the top of my toilet for the last few weeks. Its bright yellow cover with Rihanna taunts me every time I'm in the bathroom.
It's not the magazine or its stereotype bugging me, it's just a particular series of headlines I can't help but cock my head slightly sideways at and painfully yell, "Why?"
"YOUR VA-JAY-JAY," the cover said in large italic style. "Fascinating new facts about your lovely lady parts," a subheadline follows.
What has modern science suddenly discovered about the female anatomy that warrants this attention? Furthermore, why the hell is Cosmo - of all magazines - breaking the news?
Eventually curiosity gets the best, or worse, of me. I pick up the magazine, quickly digging through an ungodly amount of ads to find the story. I skim the text, searching for any vital information I might have missed in my HSC 160 class.
Alas, there is nothing new about va-jay-jays. It's all fluff.
The article is fluff, I mean.
Thanks for allowing "va-jay-jay" to slip into the vernacular, Oprah. Suddenly this slang is acceptable for large print on magazine covers. Only this word, though. After all, I don't see "Your Pee-Pee: How to be cool while using your tool," stripped across GQ this month.
I'm not arguing indecency here, just a progression of acceptable words under the guidelines of community standards. This says a lot about the way marketers and even we journalist folk have to target our words to our audiences. I don't even have a va-jay-jay, but I was still curious enough to read the article.
Back to Cosmo, I look to the right side of the cover.
"SEX HE HAS ALONE," another teaser said. "Where and when," "How often (Yikes!)" and "His shocking go-to fantasy" are bulleted below in smaller type.
Seriously?
This must be limited to women's magazines. Certainly this gossipy natured headline style targeted to the same demographic regularly watching "The View."
I fetch a copy of Details, GQ's other half in the well-groomed, "I make $35,000 a year more than you" men's magazine duo under Conde Nast Publications' control.
"If power is the ultimate aphrodisiac, why don't you wanna bang Hillary Clinton?," a May 2006 cover read.
Maybe it's just a fluke. I thumb through the pile of Details to a June/July issue from the same year.
"Sex and the public restroom: How the swankest bathrooms became the new Motel 6."
Bookmark that for later. Onward now. I pull this month's issue from a random pile.
"Size really does matter," a cover tease said. "How well do you measure up?" The inside headline reads, "Is being well hung the key to happiness?"
I flash back to the men I've seen at airport bookstores, the ones silently reading Details amidst a crowd of busy travelers. Suddenly so much is explained.
One more try, skipping back to the December 2007 issue cover.
"Are you turning your kid into a douchebag?"
Well hell, even I want to read that.
Magazines, given their distribution methods and niche audience, have always toyed with more risqué content. A newspaper has a local community to respond to, forcing more accepted wordplays and puns. The battle is all about attention, though. Publications argue over headline word choice constantly, attempting to find the construction most likely to get and keep your attention.
It can be argued that using this language (va-jay-jay, douchebag, et al) is bad journalistic form. Yet as our language develops, so must our word choices. And, as to be expected, magazines are leading the effort. Suffice to say, va-jay-jay is here to stay.
Given the number of mediated messages we get on a daily basis, it's a struggle to get our attention, let alone keep it. With our generation, if it's not Facebook, AIM or e-mail, whoever has our attention is damn lucky.
Hell, I'm lucky you started reading this column, let alone you reading this deep into it.
And it all started because of the headline.
Kudos, va-jay-jay.
Write to Dave at heydave@bewilderedsociety.com
Read More
Three Air Jam teams take home the win
October 12, 2012Nineteen teams shimmied, shook and flipped for a sold out John R. Emens Auditorium on Thursday night during the 25th annual Air Jam.
Bill Clinton Speaks at North Central High School
October 12, 2012Former President's Speech Could Have Effect on State Senate Race
