Over half term this week, we have to do the following:
- watch a film we would never normally watch
- read 2 magazines we would never normally read
- read a book we would never normally read
- listen to 3 albums from a genre we would never normally listen to.
As of today, it's one down, three to go, having read my two magazines. Magazine number one: BBC Top Of The Pops.
From this, I learned that:
- Horoscopes in teen mags are basically behavioural engineering. A typical one runs "your parents are tired, so why not help them out with chores?" or "there's a new girl at school who's feeling left out, why not make friends with her?"
- The word "cringe" is now a noun as well as a verb, as in "I had a complete cringe in front of this boy I like"
- It is acceptable in such mags to describe the pre-pubescent mini-Bieber, Ronan Parke, with the word "yum"
- Teenage girls like One Direction. This cannot be overstated. They're on just about every page of it, including the page telling you what's in the magazine next issue.
- Slashfic* is the underlying psychological driver behind teen fandom. In this case it's a kind of platonic slash-lite, but it's notable how many of the questions asked of the various boys involve friendship, hugs, togetherness, and brotherhood. Typical enquiry to One Direction: "How much do you love each other out of 100 per cent?"**
- The free bottles of nail polish and stick on jewellery are harder to apply than they look; it's probably something to do with a group of friends at a sleepover. Here's my attempt, with The Wanted looking disapprovingly on:
* This is slashfic, if you weren't aware.
** As opposed to "out of 75 per cent", one assumes.
Magazine number two: Love It!
This really was a horrendous, downmarket, prurient, depressing piece of filth. On the one hand they have horror stories about cosmetic eye surgery, on the other they offer, with no apparent irony, breast reduction as a competition prize. We have a single Mum whose way of finding personal redemption from her disfiguring burn scar is to work nights in a strip club, private dances included. Apparently men jizzing in their pants as she rubbed her vagina against their trousers made her "feel good about [her]self". There's some half-arsed analysis of celebrity couples' body language, deciding from a single photo that Fearne Cotton's boyfriend has doubts about his relationship. The embarrassing photos sent in by readers are simply not funny or remarkable in any way, and the captions added by the subs added nothing witty or charming.
I could go on, but I won't. I know there's downmarket, but this is just hideous.
Tune in tomorrow when I'll be watching Tina Fey's 2008 film "Baby Mama". Apparently it's a comedy.
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