"Magazines Are For Reading Between the Lines" By: Carissa Berardi and Ashley Milotta When you get home from a long day at school, often all you want to do is relax, put on your favorite music, and read your favorite magazine. For many teenagers, magazines are a great source for relaxation. And what pleases our English teachers is the fact that we are reading and keeping our minds occupied. If you stop to consider the importance of magazines for teens, you could easily list a few positive aspects that make having magazines readily available as essential as say pasta on an Italian menu. Magazine articles provide us with something to read, and they help us understand what is going on in the world around us. Perhaps even more important is that if a teen actively reads certain magazines, they can stay on top of such critical issues as what is hot and what is not in the realm of fashion. Hip mags such as Seventeen and YM give teens the right perspectives in being trendy. Real issues are discussed that can help the ever important social scene that teens hold in high concern. Reading these pages is like killing two birds with with one stone because knowledge is power and our verbal skills will be just as enhanced as our social skills. Did you ever consider that if you read more your conversations would be flavored with the latest news, the hippest ideas, and the trendiest styles? Alhough magazines have their positive sides, they also contain negatives too. For the most part, magazines can be very influential in our decisions; but not all that glitters is gold, as they say. Most articles in teen magazines tell readers they must wear that certain make-up, or wear that certain outfit, or be that certain person to be popular and in the crowd. Magazines can make people truly think about who they are, or what they want to become. Those quizzes or tests can influence readers as well. Many articles talk about how you should wear your make up, or how you should dress, which can make people change themselves because of a certain article. Magazines can be a bad thing if all one does is just follow what another says is cool. It is okay to say "Oh, that’s cute," or "I want that," but readers have to be careful not to be taken over by the faddish viewpoints of others. In a world that is heavily influenced by the media, one must remember that being an individual is perhaps one of the most important things a teenager can be. And reading makes one thing clear – the power of the mind to think is more important than what color eye shadow is in.