I’ve always known that glossies are the worst, but my god will this book make you want to never touch one with a ten-foot pole.

But despite its glum subject matter, the book is light, funny, and approachable, and I had a lot of fun reading it. ( )

Synopsis: Broken down into 11 chapters, The Vagenda analyses sexism throughout the years and analyses sexism in aspects of life such as magazines, bodies and work.

Some of my favourite lines:

- “It is a truth universally acknowledged that women lose their virginity and men gain experience” (p.89)

- "The message - that men are professionals and women are objects ..." (p.262)

My Opinion: If I had read this pre- the feminist movement in recent years it may have been more groundbreaking, but most of the sexism it discusses is mostly things people already know (especially if you are a female!)

I hope only one day that people will read books such as these and think "What on earth were people in that era thinking?"

I highly recommend the book to all feminists, including males.

Through educating ourselves by means such as in this book, one step at a time sexism is being stamped out. ( )

Men's magazines don't tend to feed insecurity, women's magazines seem to be designed to create insecurity in the secure.

This is a look at the history of women's magazines and how these two women became disillusioned. They ask people to look at what they're being sold and to ask the question of who benefits. I gave up buying and reading women's magazines (I do shop in the women's section of the magazine shop as that's where they put the cookery and knitting books, and I have read articles people have linked to, but overall I don't read it any more) last year and my self-image and mental health has improved immensely.

Women's magazines sell what is, to many people, unobtainable but it's sold as easy. They're full of ill-conceived advice that many times is more advertorial than journalism and people lap it up. The women in the Vagenda write about what they saw when they started being critical, and hopefully it will be a wakeup call for people to look at what they're being sold and ask why and how come it's so damaging and what would be a good magazine.

These are important questions as some of this starts to seep into men's magazines too. ( )