Just how horny are magazine editors? Horny enough to let Christina Aguilera make a skank of herself on their glossy covers.
I am particularly addressing Keith Blanchard, editor of Maxim's January 2003 issue that features Aguilera, along with the usual quasi-porn content. And also the team of editors churning out nude Aguilera pics at the once great, now desperately trying to retain relevance, Rolling Stone.
I was the first to critize Ms. Aguilera when her big comeback single "Dirrty" featured her great talents, those not of the vocal or musical variety. I always thought Aguilera had more vocal ability than the whole teen pop world could appreciate. I thought her amazing voice would catapult her into a career that would leave Britney behind to fade away Debbie Gibson style.
It's true that her record company probably controlled her image and material, stiffling the true artist inside. But now she has extricated herself from the teen pop world and is able to be the real her. The real her is apparently a prostitute, legitimately whoring herself out to millions of people who watch her videos in exchange for a $13.99 CD sale.
Normally I would be okay with a woman showing the kind of overt sexuality that is denied by fearful men seeking to control female sexual power. But in the case of Aguilera, who is clearly unaware of what a joke she has become, she is merely a pawn, a tool for newsstand sales.
May I present Maxim magazine. This is a magazine "FOR MEN," as it says on the cover. As if we couldn't tell by the headlines proclaiming "Casual Sex Fridays" and the nudie pics inside that are darn close to porn. PORN - NIPPLES = MAXIM.
This month's cover features a glistening Aguilera, a single arm folded over her one buxom breast and her sex-tousled hair barely obfuscating the other as she kneels over a swimming pool blue backdrop.
An arrow on the cover urges you to "dive into page 76!" where you find the remarkably tasteless shot of her in an innertube, her happy slut face poking out the top and her skinny white girl ass cheeks floating like buoys out the back.
Just in case you thought you'd turn the page and read an actual story about her, another spread of innertube porn shots greet you instead. One is a rather intimate foray into the crack of her butt, her face giving the quintisential porn star "You want this, big daddy?" glare.
The only piece of copy on this page is a pull quote that reads, "It's about me baring my soul and being stripped down to the real me this time." Comical! Well, your soul is two smooth, round ass cheeks and the real you is a common whore.
The copy was obviously second fiddle to the pictures. The story was just a choppy Q & A in which she says she likes aggresive sex and that her and Britney Spears were dying to get their periods on the Mickey Mouse Club. And that she has piercings in special places.
At least Rolling Stone had a better article. But this does not exculpate them for the horrible cover.
On the Nov. 14, 2002 cover of Rolling Stone, Aguilera was sprawled out on red satin sheets, her pig-colored flesh dominating the cover so that even a "Tupac Alive! Still producing albums on secluded Pacific atoll!" headline would fail to capture attention. She is naked. The photo credits list only props (a deftly placed guitar neck) and accessories (earrings, cuffs, and boots) as the items placed on her by stylists. She looks about as intimate with that guitar as she would be if she could actually play it. It's just a prop, like she is, something that symbolizes how much of a rock'n'roll bad ass she is.
There were plenty of more tasteful shots that could have been used for the cover, but noooooo, they had to go with the skankiest one they had.
Shame on the editors for taking advantage of this poor, deluded girl who is finding the real her. Someone definately needs to rein this girl in, but did the editors have to put these salacious pictures on the cover?
In Maxim on the Contents page, the caption by the Aguilera pic says that an editor wanted to shake things up and show her fully clothed -- now that editor works for Details. (Details is a much classier men's magazine.) And in the editor's letter, he says you better open the Christina Aguilera spread indoors because this girl ain't dressed for winter. She's a joke! She is an object men will gladly jack-off to, then toss aside and laugh at with his buddies.
It hurts me to see any woman, even Christina Aguilera, being used in such a way.