We all know it. Print is dead.
This is what causes once-great magazines like Rolling Stone to place fake rape stories on their cover in an attempt to regain last-minute readership, and other magazines to just give up and close up shop completely.
The infamous Sports Illustrated is the latest to wave the white flag and surrender.
Sports Illustrated has pretty much been on a landslide towards failure since their awful “Sports Illustrated TV” attempt failed back in 2002. Even ESPN: The Magazine pulls similar subscription numbers.
And why not? With this thing that came out called the “internet,” who cares about sports news that’s two months old by the time it comes out?
Sports Illustrated’s last ditch effort is to create “controversy” by putting out of shape woman/plus-sized model Ashley Graham on the cover of its Swimsuit Edition.
Yes – this is what America needs right now. Reassurance that it’s perfectly cool, ok, and even rewarding to be fat.
Don’t worry about obesity. Cancel that gym membership. Let’s check out what’s on TV.
Forget about losing weight and your physical health completely!
We’ll adjust the definition of beauty for you so you don’t have to get off the couch!
I’m not the only one concerned about this either. If our friends in the UK are worried about our recent “obesity obsession,” then maybe we should be too.
All-in-all, this is an ironic message coming from a magazine that’s done as much as any to objectify women, putting up 100ft billboards in time square featuring the skinniest, prettiest girls imaginable, oiled up to impossible-to-achieve perfection, wearing next-to-nothing.
Perhaps the most annoying thing of all about Sport Illustrated’s lame “controversy attempt” is that this magazine is entirely marketed to men.
If I remember correctly, the “women’s image movement” that recently spawned the new, more realistic-looking Barbie Dolls that set the internet on fire last week is more about encouraging women to accept their own bodies in light of the impossible standards they feel pressured to live up to. It’s not about men accepting these women.
I’ve met plenty of men who prefer a larger looking woman.
But let’s not get distracted, at the end of the day this is just an attempt to grab at remaining readers and ad dollars.
RIP Sports Illustrated.
Another man down in the long line of magazines we men looked up to when we were younger.
The truth is Sports Illustrated’s original voice has been gone for a long time now.
And it’s getting harder and harder to find a voice for men that stands for anything real these days.
The Rise Of Ashley Graham’s Plus-Sized Modeling Career…
-1987: Born in Lincoln, Nebraska
-1999: Discovered by I&I Models while at a shopping mall…at age 12…
-2003: Signs with Ford models
-2007: Profiled in Vogue
-2009: Appears in Glamour editorial “These Bodies are Beautiful at Any Size” (somehow in the “Health and Fitness” section)
-2010: Appears in a TV spot for a Lane Bryant plus-sized bra campaign that ABC refused to air during Dancing With the Stars
-2010-2011 Appears in several Levi’s campaigns
-2012: Full-Figured Fashion Week’s Plus-Sized Model of the Year
-2013: Designed a line of lingerie for Addition Elle, a Canadian plus-sized clothing retailer
-2014: Cover model for the June 2014 issue of Elle Quebec
-2015: Featured in a Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue ad for Swimsuits for All, a plus-sized retailer of women’s swimsuits, with the tagline, “You’ve Got It. Flaunt it.”
-2016: Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover girl.
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