Dear Cosmo,
I understand the print journalism industry is slowly dieing, and you’re unable to get any relevant celebrities to do your covers so you’ve resorted to people like Megan Fox and Kim Kardashian. I understand you cater to a crowd of barely-18 year old girls who desperately want to enjoy giving blow jobs to their new fraternity boyfriends. And I also understand that your staff probably consists of 12 middle-aged women who still think wearing leopard print is sexy. However despite all this, I have come to the decision that I have to stop reading you.
Dearest Cosmo, our relationship began when I was a mere 16 years old. Terrible haircuts and no knowledge of make-up carried me to you, and within months I had some basic knowledge of how to not look gross. But as the years went on, I discovered your terrible secret: every single issue of Cosmo is stupid.
At first I appreciated the wacky oh-so-embarrassing stories from readers and the real-life tips to be safe at bars and clubs. But slowly, the good parts began shrinking. Instead of a full length feature on why tanning in a booth is like swallowing gasoline, I got 12 extra pages on how to please my man. Instead of inspirational stories from strong women, I got a picture of a skinny model using underwear to tie her hair back as she goes down for a blow job. Really Cosmo? Really?
The last issue I bought, November 2009, was 236 pages. About 50 of those were ads for perfume. Another 50 were dedicated to copy-and-paste ‘articles’ ranging from clothes that are too expensive for any middle-class girl to buy, to lists of the hottest cops on TV shows. The rest of the pages were mostly pictures of men without shirts and models that look 14 years old.
Where are my self-improvement, self-empowerment pages? Where are the real life fashion and style tips? Where are the sex tips that don’t consist of ‘rub his penis till he leaves you alone and lets you sleep‘? Oh Cosmo…
It’s not me, it’s you. It’s you and your fake journalism. You and your 5 entire pages of boots that cost more than my paycheck. You and your habit of recycling articles by rearranging the words in the title. Take a hike, Cosmo.
Sincerely,
Tegan