h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I know women in England who love this so much that they make a point of touring the only half-dozen or so specialist newsagents in central Manchester who import this mag from the USA for retail sale over here, just to be sure they get their monthly copy.

Having read a few sample copies, I can see what the magazine's editorial ethos is - it's about empowering women, raising self-esteem, presenting the message that you can do it if you beleive in yourself enough and never let any man, institution, employer, et c, convince you you are secodary and insignificant. All good stuff and the sort of women's mag many men could read without either wincing, sneering, or wanting to slap the stroppy cow who's just written the latest man-bashing article. (As you do when the only available reading is Herself's copy of the latest "New Scarlet Ellesmopolitan", they're all interchangeable)

You can respect the encouraging "can do" mentality of the O-magazine and even find something interestingly new in it.

But after editorial text that empowers women and seeks to raise self-esteem and self-awareness, you get the full-page adverts for the latest drugs to pester your M.D. for... the advertising in the O-mag is just crass! Anti-depressants? SSRI's? Prozac and similar? All the sort of things the editorial content suggests a well-balanced woman does not need? Isn't there a mixed message emerging here?

Perhaps this is more "in your face" from a British perspective as this sort of direct drug advertising doesn't seem to be allowed in women's mags here - but it doesn't half undermine the message when the adverts suggest self-esteem and similar are also available in a nice handy-to-swallow tablet format, costing God knows what in your non-NHS American healthcare "system"....

You have raised an interesting point there and I do believe it is not just that magazine either that runs adverts in contradiction to trying to boost women's moral.