A dutiful feminist, I like to research whether universities in England are trying to bring into line gender equality guidelines/regulations on lad’s mags. While the NUS Women’s Campaign last year advocated lad’s mags being placed on higher shelves or obscured from view, various rumours abound in the run-up to Freshers week about FHM being included in Freshers packs.
Almost a month ago, FHM were penalised for publishing photos of a 14 year-old girl which they had put in their magazine without her consent. In many circles this would be regarded as paedophilic but since its a lad’s mag and the mag claimed that she ‘looked’ older, many people are prepared to ignore its rather sinister brand of sexism and misogyny. So you might think that universities committed to gender equality would be removing FHM from the freshers packs. Apart from its sexism, the mag assumes that all men are heterosexual and like to look at ‘boobs, footie and cars’.
If you do an online search for FHM and freshers fairs or freshers packs then a few universities come up. Chester and Coventry seem to have given them out in their packs. At other universities across Britain, hopefully the Student’s Union’s are having discussions on whether it is socially responsible to be giving lad’s mags to their new students.
Here is a link where FHM signal their intention to reach more young men through Freshers packs:
http://www.fhm-international.com/news.asp?ID=104
Quite apart from the extremely sexist and misogynistic content in their full-sized magazines, FHM caused controversy in 1999 when their student magazine included in freshers packs made insensitive comments about suicide and student: http://www.oxfordstudent.com/mt1999wk2/news/’sick’_suicide_guide
Perhaps NUS or the more ethical universities will make their own decision on whether this should be included.
Incidentally, while some men find the idea that lad’s mags are sexist ‘political correctness gone mad’, an ‘anonymous friend with a penis’ has just told me that ‘its fucking ridiculous we even need to have this discussion, this isn’t the stone age’… PC-gone mad? This one’s for you.
October 5, 2007 at 5:49 am
Thank you for bringing this to people’s attention! I hope that the more responsible Student Unions in this country will think twice before making their fresher’s packs.
October 5, 2007 at 6:55 pm
Great post. Not being a student, or really knowing any, I’m a little ignorant about fresher’s packs and such, so thanks for posting this. There are just no depths these magazines won’t stoop to, are there?
October 6, 2007 at 10:14 pm
Hey Debs, thanks! It’s partly the fault of the idiots putting together the packs as well. The pink ‘girls’ pack has cellulite cream in it, along with body spray and other such junk. And the ‘mens’ bags have soft porn. So 18 year-old women are being taught that they’re fat and smell and the only way to gain respect and attention from men is to be a topless model. Girls have to look pretty and men should look at porn as their god-given right.