Zoo Weekly - Sharing the Love…

In the last week or so, there’s been a fair amount of news coverage on the Zoo Weekly Boob Job Competition. For those who haven’t heard about it, the mens magazine Zoo Weekly has recently offered a new competition to their readers - send in pictures of your girlfriend’s cleavage, and whoever is voted the most ‘deserving’ wins $10,000 for a breast enhancement.

Apart from this being downright illegal (the NSW government is apparently holding an inquiry, to which Zoo says that the money could be spent on any cosmetic surgery procedure - still illegal), the fact that this competition is running at all shows so much about the state of feminism in Australia, and how very, very far we’ve still got to go.

The most bizarre and disturbing thing about this competition is that it is based on the idea that women would not only love to get a boob job from their boyfriends, but have had their cleavage photographed, sent into a mens magazine, and ‘judged’ by a gaggle of men. If I ever had a boyfriend so oblivious to my right to privacy, let alone inform me my body needs cosmetic surgery, I would have to - at the very, very least - give him a good slap across the face. If men have the right to comment on our bodies so easily and publicly, does this mean we can send snapshots of their penises into Cleo or Cosmopolitan in hope that we’ll win them a penis enlargement? How many men would thank their partners for that, I wonder?

It also completely forgets the very basic idea that any cosmetic enhancement procedure is still surgery - it’s dangerous. The breast implants can leak, they don’t last forever, they need to be replaced (and, if you really want, upgraded). There have been deaths due to the fluid inside the implant leaking into the lungs or the chest tissue. Not to mention, things can go wrong while in surgery. You could have complications under anaesthesia, or the surgery could be done improperly. I’m sure many of us have seen the before and after photos of breast implants that have deflated or rejected the body. How can this kind of procedure be… winnable? Why is a risky surgery being shown as a ‘great gift for both parties’?

What do you think? Would you accept this gift from your partner?

Praise Be To The Pollies

A big hello to all the lip magazine blog readers - this is my first blog, and hopefully won’t be my last.

For the last six months or so, I’ve been keeping a sharp eye on the news for election and political news - meaning I haven’t really had a life for about that time. However, an election year is always the most interesting and thought-provoking time to consider Australia as a whole - who we are, where we stand in the world, and what our values are. This election is naturally going to be one of the best times ever to see - the newbie with fresh ideas, against the veteran that knows his stuff.
A few minutes ago, I stumbled across this article that just cropped up on ninemsn:
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=285478
Basically, it says that the PM is donating an extra $15 million on top of the already guaranteed $20 million for the “Word Youth Day” - otherwise known as a Catholic event. World Youth Day means about 500,000 pilgrims will arrive in Sydney in 2008 for a celebration with a papal mass. Kevin Rudd, the Leader of the Opposition, has also pledged that he’d give a similar sum if he became PM later this year. Both politicians have campaigned on their Christian values.
Now, I’m an agnostic. I don’t know what I believe, but I know I don’t like religion, and this is one of the reasons I don’t like it. It’s just my opinion, but it’s an interesting move by both leaders. Considering how multicultural the country is nowadays, and how more and more people are becoming agnostic or atheist or what have you, why wouldn’t you campaign to other parts of the population?
Where does it leave the rest of us who aren’t Catholic or Protestant - their main targets - who are having our 35 million tax dollars being blown on a religion we don’t even believe in? Which party can we turn to? Which leader will represent our values? And what does it mean for the country when we’re combining the church with the running of government?

tattoo/piercing?

Can anyone recommend a good tattoo/piercing parlor in Canberra?

Rachel

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